What is Sand Dunes Dreaming (Tali)?
Sand Dunes Dreaming paintings depict the long red sandhills of the Central and Western Deserts. Tali is the word for sand dune in several Western Desert languages, and it is often used as the title for these works.
The Story
Desert dune country is not empty. For the people who belong to it, the sandhills, the hollows between them, the waterholes and the plants that grow there are part of the Dreaming, shaped by ancestral beings and tied to particular families and sites. A sand dune painting is a record of that country: the specific hills, waterholes and places where family lived.
Most sand dune paintings are composed as if seen from above. Long, flowing lines of dots follow the ridges of the dunes, often in bands of colour, with roundels or other marks for waterholes, camps and sites. Each artist paints their own country, so colours and compositions vary from family to family.
Maureen Nampijinpa Hudson
Maureen Nampijinpa Hudson is a senior Warlpiri painter born at Yuelamu (Mt Allan) in the Northern Territory. Sand Dunes is her father's story and the one closest to her heart: "My favourite one is Sand Dune. That is my father's story." She also paints Fire Dreaming and Women's Ceremony. Maureen is a first cousin of the late Clifford Possum Tjapaltjarri. Read more in our interview with Maureen.
Gwenda and Julieanne Turner Nungurrayi
Maureen passed her Sand Dunes and Budgerigar Dreaming stories to her daughters, Gwenda Turner Nungurrayi and Julieanne Turner Nungurrayi. Gwenda builds her dunes from flowing, wavy lines of dots applied with bottles, a technique she developed herself. Read more in our interview with Gwenda.
Alice Granites Napanangka
Alice Granites Napanangka, from Yuendumu, paints Ngalyarrpa (Sand Dunes) alongside Mina Mina Dreaming, her main subject, and Snake Vine and Pirlala (Bush Bean) Dreamings.
To learn more about Dreaming stories, read our guide to the Dreaming.
Browse sand dune paintings in our Maureen Nampijinpa Hudson, Gwenda Turner Nungurrayi, Julieanne Turner Nungurrayi and Alice Granites Napanangka collections.
Art by Farquhar is a member of the Aboriginal Art Association of Australia.