Kunkarunkara Tjukurpa
(Seven Sisters Creation Story)

This is a collaborative painting by mother Teresa Pumani-Mula and daughter Anita Pumani.
Teresa Pumani is a senior cultural woman in Mimili community who paints the Kunkarunkara Tjukurpa (Seven Sisters Creation Story). This Tjukurpa is about the constellations of Pleiades and Orion. The sisters are the constellation of Pleiades, whilst Orion is said to be Nyiru or Nyirunya (described as a bad, untrustworthy man). Teresa is one of seven sisters herself, and for her the story is “about family looking after each other, and teaching and helping each other. The women being followed by a bad man, but the older sisters are looking after the younger ones. I have four daughters,and sometimes we work together on large paintings telling the Kunkarunkara Tjukurpa. That’s our way – working together and looking afer one another."