Shield
Nosepeg Tjupurrula1954
Museums Victoria
Carlton, Australia
This shield was produced and painted by the celebrated Pintupi man, 'Nosepeg' Tjupurrula in 1954 and acquired by Museum Victoria in 1981.Although shields were manufactured by Aboriginal men primarily for fighting, they were also used on ceremonial occasions. Depending on the nature of the ceremony, certain iconographic designs were painted on the surface of the shield and employed in different parts of the ritual to evoke the power of ancestral beings originating in the 'dreamtime' (tjukurrpa). Like the iconography that appears in contemporary Aboriginal painting, the designs represent certain events and activities relating to the ancestral heroes as they wondered across the mythic landscape.
Details
- Title: Shield
- Creator: Nosepeg Tjupurrula
- Creator Lifespan: Circa 1915 - 1990
- Creator Nationality: Indigenous Australian
- Creator Gender: Male
- Creator Birth Place: Winanpa territory, south of Kaakurutintjinya, Central Australia
- Date Created: 1954
- Physical Dimensions: w215 x h680 x d80 mm
- Type: Object
- Rights: Source: Museum Victoria. Indigenous or Cultural Rights Apply, Copyright Museum Victoria: Source Museum Victoria / Photographer Benjamin Healley. Indigenous or Cultural Rights apply
- External Link: Museum Victoria Collections
- Medium: Natural pigments on wood
- Subject: Aboriginal peoples (Australians), Aboriginal art
- Description: Nosepeg Tjupurrula (c.1915–1990) was born in Winanpa territory south of Kaakurutintjinya near Lake Macdonald in Central Australia. As a young man, he developed an intimate knowledge of his country before he moved to Haasts Bluff. Here he worked as a guide and interpreter on all Welfare Branch patrols into Pintupi country between 1957 and 1964. His acting ability was also recognised by film-makers and he became one of the most popular Aboriginal actors of the mid twentieth century. He also met Queen Elizabeth II during her royal tour of Australia in 1954, and presented himself as the ‘King of the Pintupi’. Nosepeg was a leading identity at Papunya when the art movement started. He was one of the founding artists but his role in the community always took precedence over his painting. He was acknowledged as a ritual leader by Pitjantjatjara, Pintupi, Winanpa, Matjatjara and Warlpiri peoples and there was not a traditional artefact that he could not make.
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