Milpirri Banner - KARNTA (Women Dreaming) at Mina Mina

Dreaming and Design

Karnta (Women Dreaming) at Mina Mina. The straight lines are digging sticks, the waving lines are Ngalyipi (snake vine). In many paintings of this Jukurrpa the concentric circles are used to represent desert truffles that the women were collecting.

Belonging to Skin Groups

Japangardi, Japanangka, Napangardi and Napanangka (Green Group)

Information about Desert Truffle

Desert Truffles of the Australian Outback: Ecology, Ethnomycology, and Taxonomy. The Aborigines of Central Australia have traditionally used desert truffles as food. Truffle hunting in the desert requires substantial ecological knowledge, as truffles occur sporadically and only with adequate and properly distributed rainfall as well as the presence of necessary soil conditions and mycorrhizal hosts. Truffles are hunted primarily by women, who look for cracks or humps in the soil caused by the expansion of the truffles, which are then extracted with digging sticks. The truffles are typically eaten raw or baked or roasted in ashes. Seven truffle species are recorded from the Australian Outback, including three that have been only recently described.

Place

Mina Mina - Mina Mina is east of Lake Mackay on the Lake Mackay Aboriginal land Trust.

Find Lake Mackay on Google Maps - Map

Drawn By

Joe Japanangka James (dec) in 2005

See and read about Mina Mina at the other Karnta (Women Dreaming) Milpirri banner page - Photos / Information

Milpirri Artifacts Project. The 2018 Milpirri Jurntu performance theme focuses on artefacts. Tracks in collaboration with the Lajamanu Warnayaka Arts Centre are making sets boomerangs for the men and clap-sticks and dancing boards for the women. Sixteen younger women have been active painting up sets of dancing boards and clap sticks which they will dance with in the 2018 Milpirri performance. They were guided through the process by established female Lajamanu artists. The artifacts designs come from the Milpirri banners. (l-r) Elizabeth Nungarrayi Ross, Sylvannia Nungarrayi Spencer and Amanda Napangardi Dixon. Photo Anna Spencer.

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