[5] A number of the men developed a distinctive style of narrative painting that, beginning around 1976, resulted in the production of several "monumental" works that included representations of both their traditional lands and of ceremonial iconography.

[6][7] Clifford Possum was the first to make this transition commencing with a related painting, also titled Warlugulong (1976), now held by the Art Gallery of New South Wales.

[8] The two images are amongst five that the artist created between 1976 and 1979 that linked the iconography of sacred stories to geographic representation of his country – the land to which he belonged and about which he had traditional knowledge.

[14][notes 2] Art critic Benjamin Genocchio has referred to the 1977 work as also being by the brothers;[13] however, the National Gallery of Australia credits it solely to Clifford Possum.

[9] Like the other four works of the period that are symbolic maps of the artist's country, the painting is accompanied by annotated diagrams of the images and notes that explain the dreamings that they include.

[9] This work excludes elements of several dreamings associated with country further south, which had been included in the painting created by Clifford Possum and his brother a year earlier.

[17] The artist also modified some of the iconography, and limited the explanations of the painting, omitting secret-sacred dimensions of the stories to avoid offending other Indigenous men, and in recognition that most of the audience for the work would be uninitiated non-Indigenous people.

[8] The work and the price it achieved at auction in 2007 are cited as evidence of both the importance of Clifford Possum as an artist, and of the maturation and growth of the Australian Indigenous art market.

The auction house trading the work expected it to fetch around $5,000 and did not make a feature of it in the catalogue, but dealers including Hank Ebes, the successful bidder, recognised the painting's significance and it sold for $36,000 plus commission.