Donated through the Australian Government’s Cultural Gifts Program by Wayne and Vicki McGeoch. National Museum of Australia
Titled Going Home, this painting shows people packing up and leaving the mission at Warburton to return to Warakurna.
In 1974, the Australian Government approved the return of land to Aboriginal communities. This meeting is happening in the bottom right corner of the painting.
In this painting, Porter recalls the moment when people returned to ‘ngurraku’ or ‘my place’.
Questions
In the painting, what objects are people packing to take to their new home?
If you were moving to a new place to build a new community, what would you pack?
Why would you choose those objects?
Eunice Yunurupa Porter
Born 1948, Yiparrka skin group
Eunice Yunurupa Porter is a respected leader and artist in the Warakurna community. She was born at Wirrkural on the Jameson road out of Warburton mission, and lived with her family in the bush before attending school at the Mission from about the age of 10.
Warakurna was Porter’s late husband’s country. They moved there together in 1974 after a meeting with the newly established Department of Aboriginal Affairs raised the possibility of people moving back to their homelands.
