Nyuju Stumpy Brown - Indigenous Australian Painter

“My paintings are about my country, my mother’s country and my father’s country. We lived in the desert country. I paint the waterholes and bush tucker found at those waterholes."

 Nyuju Stumpy Brown (1 July 1924 – September 2011) was a Wangkatjungka Indigenous Australian painter, domestic worker, and a prominent figure in the law and culture of Fitzroy Crossing, Western Australia. Nyuju Stumpy Brown was born 1 July 1924 on the Canning Stock Route in Ngapawarlu, Western Australia. She grew up in the Great Sandy Desert. She was also known as Kumanjayi Brown.
Brown had a spontaneous painting style that heavily incorporated colors. Several of her works included a circle as a symbol for various subjects including geographical places, waterholes, and bush foods.
While describing her work Pura (2003), art curator Wally Caruana stated, "Her canvases have a jewel-like quality about them that are one part Venetian glass, two parts Hundertwasser, and five parts Great Sandy Desert with a twist of Lower Manhattan graffiti." Caruana added that: "It came as no surprise to learn she had worked with other senior artists on two huge canvases that were used in a native title action in 1996. "In the hearings, claimants stand on their section of the `map' and describe their relationship to their land," writes Caruana, "and the relationship to the land of neighbouring groups. In each painting, the only concession to Western mapping is the depiction of the Canning Stock Route as a point of reference for those comparing the painting to a European map of the region."Wikipedia