Seven Sisters Dreaming - Aboriginal Art, Story and Songline

The Seven Sisters Dreaming is one of the most ancient, widespread and visually spectacular stories in Aboriginal Australia. It is a story of pursuit and escape, of forbidden desire and the bonds of family - and it is painted by artists from communities right across the continent. Understanding it transforms the way you see the paintings that carry it.

The story and the stars

The Seven Sisters Dreaming is a songline that stretches across more than half the width of Australia, from the Central Desert to the west coast, passing through the country of many different language groups. According to the National Museum of Australia, it is one of the most widely distributed Dreaming stories in Aboriginal Australia.

The story is connected to the Pleiades - the cluster of seven stars in the constellation Taurus, visible low on the horizon in the Central Australian night sky. In Aboriginal cultures across the continent, these stars are understood to be the seven sisters themselves, still travelling across the sky as they have since the Dreaming began.

The story

While the details vary between language groups and regions, the central narrative is consistent. Seven ancestral women - the sisters - are pursued across the land by a man who desires one of them as a wife. The pursuit is forbidden under traditional law because the man is of the wrong skin group. In Anangu (APY Lands) versions of the story, the pursuer is known as Wati Nyiru. In Warlpiri versions from the Central Desert, he appears as a Jakamarra man.

As the sisters flee, they shape the landscape - creating waterholes, rock formations, sandhills and sacred sites as they travel. At various places along the songline, they narrowly escape, using their digging sticks and their knowledge of country to outrun and outwit their pursuer. Eventually, unable to escape on earth, the sisters ascend into the sky and become the Pleiades star cluster. The man who pursues them follows, becoming the constellation seen near Orion. Every night the chase continues across the sky.

A story for women

The Seven Sisters songline is understood as primarily owned by senior women, and its protection is their responsibility. It encodes deep knowledge about country, survival, morality, kinship and the consequences of transgressing cultural law. Some elements of the story are shared publicly. Others are sacred and restricted to initiated women.

The Seven Sisters songline has been the subject of major exhibitions at institutions including the Art Gallery of South Australia and the National Museum of Australia, reflecting its significance as one of the most important living stories in Australian Aboriginal culture.

Different names across the country

The story travels under different names as it crosses different language groups. Among the Anangu of the APY Lands it is known as Kungkarangkalpa. In Warlpiri country it is called Napaljarri-warnu Jukurrpa. Among the Martu people of Western Australia it is called Minyipuru. Each community holds their own section of the songline, with their own custodians, their own ceremonies and their own visual language for depicting it.

Seven Sisters paintings at Art by Farquhar

Art by Farquhar works with several artists whose Dreaming includes the Seven Sisters story, each painting it from their own country and cultural perspective.

Maureen Nampijinpa Hudson is a Warlpiri artist born in 1959 at Mt Allan, approximately 300km north of Alice Springs. Drawing on Dreaming stories passed down through her father's country of Warlukulongu, her Seven Sisters works depict the Napaljarri-warnu Jukurrpa in her distinctive rhythmic dot work. Her paintings have been exhibited nationally and internationally, including in London, Seattle and Colorado.

Janice Stanley is a third generation artist of the Stanley family from Ernabella in the APY Lands. While she is best known for her Pantu (salt lake) paintings, the Seven Sisters songline passes through APY Lands country and is deeply woven into the landscape and culture her work carries.

Michelle Possum Nungurrayi is a Warlpiri and Anmatyerre artist from the Central Desert whose Seven Sisters Dreaming paintings connect the celestial story to the country of her ancestors. Her large-scale works are among the most visually arresting interpretations of this story in contemporary Aboriginal art.

Browse Seven Sisters paintings at farquhar.art/collections or contact us at sales@farquhar.art.