Water Dreamingby Shanna Napanangka Williams

This beautiful maze like small painting depicts the site of Puyurru, to the west of Yuendumu. It is a significant place for Shanna and her family. Puyurru is usually dry creek beds which are water soakages or natural occuring wells. The Jukurrpa (Dreaming) talks of two Jangala men who were rainmakers,  they would sing the rain, unleashing a gaint storm. It travelled across the country with lightning striking the land. The storm met another storm from Wapurtali, to the west, where it was picked up by a "Kirrkarlan" (Brown Falcon) and carried further west until it dropped the storm at Purlungyanu. It was here that a great soakage was created. At Puyurru a bird dug up a gaint snake "Warnayarra" (The Rainbown Serpent) and the snake carried water to create the large lake, Jillyiumpa, near an oustation in this country. This particular Dreaming story belongs to the Jangala men and the Nangala women. In contemporary Warlpiri paintings such as this one, Shanna uses an underground view of the underground rivers found around Puyurru. In some of her other paintings she will use traditional iconography to represent her Jukurrpa (Dreaming). In many paintings of Ngapa Dreaming the curved and straight lines represent "Ngawarra" (Flood Waters) which run through the landscape.