Naata Nungurrayi was born in 1932 at Kumil, west of the Pollock Hills in Western Australia. A Pintupi woman, she came in to Papunya with her family on one of Jeremy Long’s government patrols, and later lived at Kintore, where she became one of the leading senior elders of the women’s painting movement.

Naata came from a family of renowned artists: she was the sister of George Tjungurrayi and Nancy Nungurrayi, and her son is the artist Kenny Williams Tjampitjinpa. She passed away in September 2021.

In 1994, the Pintupi “painting women” emerged at a women’s painting camp held behind the women’s mountain at Kintore, bringing together senior women from the Kintore region and their kinswomen from the Ikuntji Women’s Centre at Haasts Bluff. In 1999 Naata contributed to the Kintore women’s painting for the Western Desert Dialysis Appeal.

Naata painted the stories of the Tingari, ancestral beings who travelled across vast stretches of Country, performing rituals and creating particular sites. The Tingari women usually followed the men, accompanied by novices, and their travels are held in a number of song cycles. Naata had the right to paint these stories through her initiation and ceremonial knowledge.