Yalka Tjukurpa (Bush Onion Dreaming)

Size: 68 x 210

Orientation: Landscape

The Artist: Irene Gorey Nampijinpa

The Story: Irene Gorey Nampijinpa was born in Papunya, a small Aboriginal community roughly 240 km northwest of Alice Springs in the Northern Territory. In Aboriginal culture, women gather, men hunt, and food is shared across the community. Women go on gathering trips together to collect seasonal wild foods and medicines. Here, the women are collecting wild bush onions (yalka). The yalka plant looks like grass and has small edible bulbs found just beneath the ground. Yalka can be eaten raw, straight out of the ground, or cooked in the hot ashes of the campfire.