As an artist, he created hundreds of pencil and watercolour drawings, as well as incised pearl shells and boab nuts, that convey powerful connections to his Country.
Many of the stories depicted are connected to the Jirkalli area on Dampier Downs station, but many others belong to or affect the Jukun, Yawuru and Karajarri people nearby.
Whilst secular themes are frequently realistically rendered, Aboriginal artists often choose to use more traditional styles for such content.
He recorded a vast amount of cultural knowledge, which he considered to be vital to an Aboriginal person's sense of identity, and was acutely aware of its rapid loss and the impact of this on individual wellbeing.
[1] Nangan was most prolific in the 1970s and 1980s, fulfilling commissions from Western Australian art dealer Mary Macha for three exhibitions held in between 1981 and 1983.
Nangan was familiar with the Riji - the pearl shell and cloth ceremonial insignia traditionally worn by Aboriginal men from his Country.
The first of these were possibly produced through contact with anthropologist Helmut Petri who obtained some of Nangan's drawings in the mid-1950s and believed they were his first naturalistic works on paper.
[8] Nangan mostly used a soft lead pencil to outline and shade the characters and landforms depicted, reserving bright colour and washes to highlight important features such as body decoration, weaponry and vegetation.
However, when Nangan's works were prepared for sale, the pages of the sketchbooks were often separated and the margins cut off, severing a vital link between a drawing and any transcribed explanation.