Joy Purvis Pitjara b. 1962

Joy Purvis Pitjara grew up at Atneltye, or Boundary Bore, in the expansive homelands region of Utopia, some 300km north-east of Mparntwe (Alice Springs).  A vast area comprising of many small communities and outstations, Utopia holds significant cultural and artistic heritage. This region has seen the emergence of some of the most revered Aboriginal artists of the contemporary movement. Joy is the daughter of one such renowned artist, Glory Ngale, and sister to Anna Price Pitjara (also spelled Petyarre) and Delvine Pitjara. 

Joy began painting in 1980, and usually depicts styles popularised by her mother and aunties, such as Bush Medicine and Pencil Yam designs. Joy represents the native bush medicine botanicals that grow in her ancestral country, which are collected to be prepared for eating or to be used by the women to treat certain ailments. One of the many ways that bush medicine can be prepared is by grinding the dried leaves into a fine powder and mixing them with animal fats to extract the medicinal qualities and create a healing balm. In this painting, Joy depicts kame, the tiny seeds and seed pods of the of the creeping pencil yam plant. Kame is a major Dreaming story in Utopia that details the weather patterns and the harmony in nature that is essential to bringing abundance to Country – the strong desert winds that scatter the seeds across the earth, and the summer rains that bring the cherished plant to life. The pencil yam is an important source of carbohydrate in the Utopia region, and also holds significant spiritual meaning - song and ceremony are dedicated to the pencil yam, as it is both a food source and a healing medicine.

Joy’s paintings express her innate sense of colour, and by carefully using the tip of a paintbrush for her dotting technique, can combine many colours within a single dot, and creates movement and mesmerising pattern across her canvases. Joy is also a published translator for children’s books.