Biography

As a Western Desert artist painting in the Papunya area some 250 kilometres west of Alice Springs, Paddy Carroll works were mainly available through Papunya Tula Artsists Pty Ltd, a cooporative set up by the artists in 1971.

Paddy Carroll lived and worked in the Papunya area and in Alice Springs, his works are in major collections throughout Australia.

Born c.1927 or earlier
Region Western Desert
Community Centre Papunya
Language Bloc Arandic, Ngarrkic
Language Anmatyerre, Warlpiri
Social Affiliations Tjungurrayi subsection

Subjects and Themes

Witchetty grub, wallaby, bush potato, possum, carpet snake, budgerigar

Dreamings

Witchetty Grub, Wallaby, Yala (Bush Potato), Possum, Goanna, Woman, Man, Malyippi (Sweet Potato), Wapiti (Sweet Potato), Yawalyurra (Bush Grapes), Mukaki and other Bush Tucker stories, Carpet Snake, and Ngati jirri (Budgerigar)

Notes

Paddy Carroll's mother's country is the site of Winparrku near Haasts Bluff. Paddy grew up in this area, the family coming in to Haasts Bluff and Yuendumu to collect rations of bread and tea. His father was shot by Europeans in the Coniston massacre of 1928. Paddy knows little of his father's country; his mother refused to speak of it after the murder. Two of Paddy's brothers also fled to Queensland. The three finally met up again when Paddy was a young man in his early twenties and they found themselves in the same army unit stationed in Elliott near Darwin during World War II.

Jimmy KITSON, a leading ceremonial figure in the Willowra community, is also Paddy's brother. After the war, Paddy lived in Alice Springs and Darwin, working across the country as a carpenter and stockman. He worked for thirty years at Narwietooma station, droving cattle across the Tanami and helping to lay telegraph lines in remote areas. He began painting in about 1977 when John Kean was running Papunya Tula Artists and Paddy and his family were living at Three Mile Bore, an outstation of Papunya. David CORBY was probably influential in his starting to paint. Paddy's extensive ceremonial knowledge is indicated by the range of Dreaming stories depicted in his paintings.

For a time, he lived at Inapanu outstation, near Mt Lori, and sometimes in Papunya. In 1991
he travelled to America with Dinny Nolan Tjampitjinpa, visiting colleges and Native American
communities on a tour organised by poets Billy Marshall-Stoneking and Nigel Roberts. Paddy Carroll once remarked to a journalist puzzling over the meaning of a painting's iconography that 'We have had to learn your language, now it is time you learned ours.' Paddy and his second wife, Ruby Nangala, now live in their new house at Three Mile outstation, just north of Papunya.
(Aboriginal Artists of the Western Desert. By Vivien Johnson)

Commissions

Painted the concentric circles included in the design of the Bicentennial $A10 note issued in 1988.
He was one of five Papunya Tula artists invited to submit designs for the mosaic for the new Parliament House in Canberra.

Collections

Artbank, Sydney.
Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide.
Art Gallery of Western Australia, Perth.
Berndt Museum of Anthropology, University of Western Australia.
Broken Hill Art Gallery.
Flinders University Art Museum, Adelaide.
Museum of Victoria, Melbourne.
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra.
Parliament House Art Collection, Canberra.
The Holmes a Court Collection, Perth.
The Kelton Foundation, Santa Monica, U.S.A.

Exhibitions

1981 Anvil Art Gallery, Albury
1982 Brisbane Festival, Brisbane
1982 Georges Exhibition, Melbourne
1983 Mori Gallery, Sydney
1984 Anvil Art Gallery, Albury
1984 Painters of the Western Desert: Clifford Possum Tjapaltjarri, Paddy Carroll
Tjungurrayi and Uta Uta Tjangala, Adelaide Artsfestival
1984 Papunya and Beyond, Araluen Centre, Alice Springs
1984 Aboriginal Art, an Exhibition Presented by the Australian Institute of
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies, Canberra
1985 Dot and Circle, a retrospective survey of the Aboriginal acrylic paintings
of Central Australia, Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, Melbourne
1989 Aboriginal Art: The Continuing Tradition, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra
1990 Art Dock, Contemporary Art from Australia, Noumea, New Caledonia
1990 Contemporary Aboriginal Art from the Robert Holmes a Court Collection,
Harvard University, University of Minnesota, Lake Oswego Center for the Arts,
United States of America
1991 The Painted Dream: Contemporary Aboriginal Paintings from the Tim and Vivien
Johnson Collection, Auckland City Art Gallery and Te Whare Taonga Aoteroa National
Art Gallery, New Zealand.
1992 Tjukurrpa, Museum fur Volkerkunde, Basel.
1992/3 New Tracks Old Land: An Exhibition of Contemporary Prints from Aboriginal
Australia, touring USA and Australia
1993 Aboriginal Art Exhibition, Kung Gubunga,Oasis Gallery, Broadbeach,Qld
1993 Tjukurrpa, Desert Dreamings, Aboriginal Art from Central Australia (1971-1993),
Art Gallery of Western Australia, Perth WA
1993 The Tenth National Aboriginal Art Award Exhibition, Museum and Art Gallery of
the Northern Territory, Darwin
1994 The Eleventh National Aboriginal Art Award Exhibition, Museum and Art Gallery
of the Northern Territory, Darwin

Select Bibliography

Crocker, A. (ed.), 1981, Mr Sandman Bring Me a Dream, Papunya Tula Artists Pty Ltd, Alice Springs and Aboriginal Artists Agency Ltd, Sydney. (C)
Isaacs, J., 1984, Australia's Living Heritage, Arts of the Dreaming, Lansdowne Press, Sydney. (C)
Isaacs, J., 1989, Australian Aboriginal Paintings, Weldon Publishing, New South Wales.
Johnson, V., 1993, Twentieth Century Dreaming, Contemporary Aboriginal Art, Art and Asia
Pacific, quarterly journal Vol 1 No 1 December.
Johnson, V., 1994, The Dictionary of Western Desert Artists, Craftsman House,
East Roseville, New South Wales. (C)
Maughan, J., and Zimmer, J., (eds), 1986, Dot and Circle, a Retrospective Survey of the Aboriginal Acrylic Paintings of Central Australia, exhib. cat., Communication Services Unit, Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, Melbourne. (C)
Premont, R., and Lennard, M., 1988, Tjukurrpa, Desert Paintings of Central
Australia, Centre for Aboriginal Artists, Alice Springs.
1990, Contemporary Aboriginal Art from the Robert Holmes a Court Collection,
exhib. cat., Heytesbury Holdings Ltd., Perth.
1993, Tjukurrpa Desert Dreamings, Aboriginal Art from Central Australia (1971-1993),
exhib. cat., Art Gallery of Western Australia, Perth. (C)

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