"Senior male painter Pincher Talunga composes the most complex linear designs, which read as abstracts or landscapes ­ or both ­ by reproducing the dots that decorate the formidable hook-pointed or nulla nullas spears."Australian Art Review

Biography

Pincher Talunga is an elder and leader of ceremony. He moved to the community of Peppimenarti many years ago and like his father, he has taught the boys about dancing and bodypainting. He has always painted his designs on traditional materials and began painting on canvas recently. His layers of linear dots are a direct representation of men's ceremonial designs.

Talunga's work is the result of careful placement yet embodies free movement and rhythm.

"Senior male painter Pincher Talunga composes the most complex linear designs, which read as abstracts or landscapes ­ or both ­ by reproducing the dots that decorate the formidable hook-pointed or nulla nullas spears."

"For 15 minutes we had the privilege of watching him fill in a bit of red ground, placing black dots between white ones already there. He works with a water-colour brush with its bristles cut to make a tiny stumping tool. On, for example, a red ground, lines of dots in white are laid out, and secondary ones in, for example, olive, are placed here and there, on different smallish areas of the canvas, with an occasional 'tut tut'. The secondaries may overlap the primary dots or not: they are laid in, not mechanically, but intuitively. The method of painting establishes a temporary local balance that will merge into an overall economy of style, as the process is repeated, again and again. The work is organic ­ even though one suspects that Pincher has it all in his head from the start, it progresses part by little living part. Facture is fastidious, but happy accidents occur. Pincher starts from both 'ends' of a canvas, leaving what happens when the lines of dots meet open to serendipity. And since he keeps his wet paint in little plastic dishes, the wind can lead to accidents ­ if too unhappy they are wiped up; if not they are left as a relief to the precision of the whole. They act like Stravinsky's discords."
Australian Art Review.