Rosie Tarku King: Jila

“As Tarku would sit and paint with her sister Penny (K-Lyons) she was always telling stories of leaving her Ngurra and travelling North.

With each brush stroke she would paint the jilas (waterholes) and countless jiljis (Sandhills) that she remembered.

A bright and bubbly lady with a contagious laugh that would echo in the gallery and studio.

Over the years her style slowly changed with an early on-set dementia. From strong desert style she shared with her sister Penny, to a more loose, abstract style.

Her stories remained the same as the memory of Ngurra will never fade”

— Lynley Nargoodah

I was born at a jumu (soak water) called Payinjarra in the Great Sandy Desert. I walked out from the desert with my husband when I was a young girl. I left my mother and brother Kumanjayi Pijaju behind at Japingka. My husband had two wives, my older sister and myself. These two passed away a long time ago, here in the river country at Brooking Springs Station.

When we left the desert we walked for a long time, it was a long way. We were walking and hunting. We killed pussycat and wirlka (sand goanna) for food but no kangaroo. I was walking, all the time worrying about my mother but I kept going. My husband and my sister were both cheeky, they hit me for no reason. I was crying for my mother.

I got away from them once, they were too cheeky to me and telling me, “come on you have to go”. I told them, “No, I want to go back to my mother”. They kept telling me “No, you have to keep going”. I was frightened but I came out at Old Bililluna. There were planes landing right there, I was frightened of that plane. From there, all of us kids went walking and looking at the plane that had landed. I didn’t know any English, I just looked at the kartiya (Europeans).

We kept going and we saw kartiya getting water in a bucket from a well. This was new to me too, it was the first time I had seen this. We had no shoes, we were wearing yakapiri.

I talked only Juwaliny when I came but today I speak Juwaliny, Walmajarri, Kriol and English. After that, a motor car came from Moola Bulla to Old Bililluna and took us to Moola Bulla. We came out there, frightened in the car, we hadn’t seen one before. We didn’t know anyone there either. I met Munmurria Daisy Andrews there and her first son. I didn’t know her before then.