George Ward Tjungurrayi was born near Wala Wala, a claypan and soakage in the far Western Desert, in the country around Kiwirrkurra. At about 17 he set out on foot from the Gibson Desert with three Pintupi companions, walking east until they were met near Mount Doreen. He reached Papunya in 1962, and later that year guided Jeremy Long’s government patrol back into Pintupi Country.

His ancestral Country takes in the sites around Wala Wala, Kiwirrkurra, Lake Mackay, Kulkuta, Karku, Ngaluwinyamana and Kilpinya, north-west of Kintore across the WA border. He passed away in 2023.

Encouraged by Nosepeg Tjupurrula, George began painting for Papunya Tula Artists around 1976. He painted the Tingari Cycle of his Country: ancient stories of the Tingari, ancestral beings who travelled the land in the Dreaming, performing ceremonies and creating its sites.

His early works used the dotted grids of lines and circles shared by the Pintupi Tingari painters. By the mid-1990s he had distilled this into his signature style: two-tone lines rippling around roundels and shapes, creating a powerful optical rhythm across the canvas.