BORN: 1960
LANGUAGE: Pintupi
AREA: Kwirrkurra
It was in late 1984, Walala and several other members of the Pintupi Tribe walked out of the remote wilderness of the Gibson Desert in Western Australia and made contact for the first time with European society. Described as 'The Lost Tribe', he and his family created international headlines. Until that day in 1984, Walala and his family lived the traditional and nomadic life of a hunter-gatherer society. Their intimate knowledge of the land, its flora and fauna and waterholes allowed them to survive, as their ancestors had for thousands of years.
In 1996 Walala began to paint in his own distinctive style. His work represents dreamtime stories from the past, mainly associated with the Tingari cycle and men's dreaming sites in his country near Lake Mackay in Western Australia.