Selina Fisher Napanangka

Selina Napanganka Fisher is an artist from Yuendumu. Here she paints her version of the Pikilyi Jukurrpa (Vaughan Springs Dream), a sacred watering hole and stream in the Central Desert, where legend has it that a pair of Rainbow Serpents lived together even though their relationship was taboo due to the incompatibility between their two clan groups: women came to remove the lice attached to the bodies of the two mythical beings, who in exchange gave them the right to take water from the stream. The Aborigines still celebrate ceremonies in this place, where the spirits of the two snakes still reside. Rather than being represented figuratively on this canvas, they are simply evoked by the binary aspect of the composition, symbolising the profound difference between their two clans.