Pastor Roy Yaltjanki describes his Country as alive with Tjukurpa, criss-crossed with songlines which belong to it and travel through it. The works in this exhibition depict the places and stories Roy has learnt about all his life; first as a child, playing and growing up on the land; later, as a young man travellng to his Country, learning the sacred knowledge of the law, being initiated into this deeper understanding of Country; and finally, a time that extends to the present, when he provides spiritual guidance as both a senior law man and an ordained Christian minister to his family and community in Kaltukatjara (Docker River). His understanding of this country is unique in its depth and breadth.

Roy’s goal with these works is to convey a vision of these places as he saw them as a child – beautiful, special, powerful and full of life. Born around 1933 in the bush at Wangkari, a sacred waterhole relating to the Seven Sisters story, the land provided everything his family needed to live well. The Country was replete with bush food – malu (kangaroo), tinka (goanna), kampurarpa (bush berries), ili (fig), nyuma (damper cakes made with native seeds). Roy’s works, with their dense, colourful layers of dotting, convey this sense of abundance.

Pastor Roy’s life has been long, varied and full of knowledge – knowledge of the land, of Christian faith, of Tjukurpa, of traditional craft. While he sporadically painted and carved punu (wooden artefacts) previously, in 2023 he began painting every day at Kaltukatjara art centre in Docker River. From open until close he sits and paints, often singing and humming to accompany the application of paint to canvas. Commencing with the area of his birthplace, he has worked outwards geographically and conceptually to create a network of maps of his Country. This incredible concentration on the specificity of place is at the heart of these works. In an earlier piece titled Outstations (2023), Roy positioned Kaltukatjara community in the direct centre of the canvas – and his world – with roads stretching to the far-away lesser “outstations” of Sydney, Melbourne, Perth, etc. He has methodically depicted the places which matter most to him, embedding and preserving layers of knowledge into the works themselves. These places resonate with themes of providence, bounty, and joy, the land teeming with life and thrumming with the power of Tjukurpa.