Doreen Reid Nakamarra
Doreen Reid Nakamarra
BORN
CIRCA 1955, WARBURTON RANGES, WA
DIED 2009
COUNTRY
PINTUPI / NGAATJATJARRA
COMMUNITY
KIWIRRKURA, WA
LANGUAGE
PINTUPI / NGAATJATJARRA
About
Doreen Reid Nakamarra was born in the Warburton Ranges, circa 1955. She spent her childhood living a traditional semi-nomadic lifestyle with her extended family. When she was a young girl, Doreen walked in to the settlement at Haasts Bluff with her parents, later trekking hundreds of kilometers across the desert to settle in Papunya. As a young woman, Doreen continued her travels, moving between Areyonga, Docker River and Kintore, before marrying and settling in Kiwirrkura.
Doreen first began painting for Papunya Tula Artists in 1996. She became a prolific artist, painting the stories of her Country around Kintore and Kiwirrkura before her death in late 2009. Doreen leaves behind a powerful legacy in her work, having been awarded the General Painting Award in the 25th Telstra National Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Art Award (2008). Her works are held in many major collections including the NGA, NGV, AGNSW, AGSA, and the Harvard Art Museum, Toledo Museum of Art, Seattle Art Museum, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in America.
WORK
Doreen Reid’s painting, Women’s ceremonies at Marrapinti depicts designs associated with the rockhole site of Marrapinti, west of the Pollock Hills in Western Australia. During ancestral times, a group of women of the Nangala and Napangati kinship subsections camped at Marrapinti on their travels towards the east. While here, the women made nose bones, also known as marrapinti, which are worn through a hole in the septum. During the ceremonies relating to Marrapinti, the older women pierced the nasal septums of the young female participants. At the conclusion of the ceremony, the women continued their travels east, passing through Wala Wala, Ngaminya and Wirrulnga, before heading north-east to Wilkinkarra (Lake Mckay). The lines in this painting depict the rippling tali (sandhills) surrounding Marrapinti.
Renowned for her fastidious geometric linework and complex optical fields, Doreen was a truly formidable artist. Painted in the year of her death, ‘Women’s ceremonies at Marrapinti’ is an example of the artist working at the peak of her craft.
