Recently we acquired this beautiful painting ‘Narangga Nation’ ‘by the indigenous artist, Cedric Varcoe. The painting depicts the Naraagga people on the York Peninsula, where Cedric was born. Cedric was inspired by his family painting and the stories from Ngarrindjeri country and culture told to him by the elders of the Ngarrindjeri language group. 

One of the stories you can see in the painting is about Winda the Owl who lived in a cave above the beach near Ardrossan. Winda the Owl was in the form of a man and he had two dogs (gadli) who he sends to eat the young beach birds (tuketja) on the beach. When the parents of the beach birds come home, they cried and mourned, then the husband went looking for Winda. On his way he meets a kangaroo (Nantha), he tells Nantha what happened, and the kangaroo decides to help him by luring out Winda’s two dogs out of their cave and killing them. Winda refused to come out of his cave so the Tuketja cursed him to only appear in the dark. So, to this day, Winda lives in caves and dark places and only comes out at night.

This painting is absolutely stunning and all who admire it find that the detail and intricacies of all the elements is incredible. The longer you stare at it the more you notice, it’s a lovely addition to our office and we are so proud to be supporting local artists.