Turkey Tolson Tjupurrula

Born near Haasts Bluff, Northern Territory, Turkey Tolson was a major figure in the Papunya Tula art movement, and the longest-serving chairman of the company formed to represent its artists.

A painter whose creative output spanned nearly three decades, controversy erupted briefly in 1999, when disputed declarations were made by the artist regarding whether some works under his signature had been painted by some female relatives.

Son of Toba Tjakamarra, one of the first Pintupi people to come into European settlements out of the Western Desert, Turkey Tolson was born near Haasts Bluff, west of Alice Springs, Northern Territory.

[3] 'Tjupurrula' (in Pintupi) (also commonly seen as 'Jupurrula', this being the Warlpiri spelling) is a skin name, one of sixteen used to denote the subsections or subgroups in the kinship system of central Australian Indigenous people.

This painting was described by both art expert Vivian Johnson and critic Susan McCulloch-Uehlin as his masterpiece,[6][7] and by obituarist Rebecca Hossack as his most famous work: "a series of shimmering horizontal lines representing spears being heated and straightened over a fire by Tolson's ancestors".

[1] This and other similar works were described by art critic Susan McCulloch-Uehlin as representing not only the preparation of the spears, but also elements of Dreamings concerning fights between ancestral figures at a rock bluff west of Alice Springs.

Rather, "Turkey's work is threatened by corruption because the conditions of his presence in Alice Springs – his need for more regular income and his dealer's need for 'product' – draw him away from the experiences that inform his painting.

Haasts Bluff, Northern Territory, where Turkey Tolson Tjupurrula was born and raised.