Parrtjima festival 2021: a dazzling display of light in Australia’s red centre – in pictures

Until 18 April, the Alice Springs Desert Park in the Northern Territory is home to the world’s only Indigenous light festival: a family-friendly playground of illuminated sculptures under clear starry nights, with a light and sound show projected across two kilometres of the MacDonnell Ranges soundtracked by Electric Fields.

Curated by Rhoda Roberts, this year’s festival is themed Future Kultcha: a celebration of knowledge passing from one generation to the next, featuring high-tech installations based on work by Indigenous Australian artists from across the central desert, and a program of films, talks, workshops and shows

  • Parrtjima festival is a free event, but pre-registrations are encouraged for Covid-safety. Find out more here

Main image: Harvesting Kultcha, an installation which features My Hunting Country by Yvonne Ngwarraye Bonney. Photograph: Parrtjima 2021

  • The artworks at Parrtjima were mostly sent in via an expression of interest, which went out to more than 40 Aboriginal art centres. The selected pieces were then aligned to installation concepts designed by the Parrtjima creative team, with oversight from a reference group made up of people with connection to Mparntwe, Antulye and Irlpme: the three estate groups of the native title holders of Mparntwe (Alice Springs).
    Merging Kultcha installation

  • This installation, Merging Kultcha, is a celebration of the cameleers who worked through the Australian outback from the 1860s to the 1930s – many of whom married into Indigenous communities. It encompasses a train of five camels, three metres high, crafted out of mosaics of coloured glass lit from above. The mosaics feature an artwork titled Crossroads, by Chantelle Mulladad.
    Merging Kultcha

  • Mulladad comes from the community of Ltyentye Apurte (Santa Teresa); her mother is the artist Patricia Oliver, a founding member of Keringke Art Centre. ‘Crossroads was based on my teenage years,’ Mulladad told the Guardian. ‘I had to choose which path to go on, and I chose the right path to make something of myself and be an artist.’
    Crossroads by Chantelle Mulladad

  • Mulladad’s work currently also adorns three carriages of the Ghan: a 900-metre luxury train that travels the 2,973km stretch between Darwin and Adelaide. Accompanied by an installation in one of the carriages, Crossroads will feature on the train for a couple of weeks, in collaboration with Parrtjima festival.
    Crossroads by Chantelle Mulladad, wrapped around the Ghan

  • Harvesting Kultcha, another Parrtjima installation, has at its centre an artwork titled My Hunting Country by Yvonne Ngwarraye Bonney, of the Ampilatwatja art community.
    My Hunting Country by Yvonne Ngwarraye Bonney

  • Bonney’s artwork has been turned into a three-dimensional illuminated honey ant nest, with eight giant honey ants leaving tracks behind them as they journey out. Activation pads – when jumped or stomped on – fill their honey sacs with golden light, in a work which ‘pays homage to the traditional knowledge of women gathering the honey ants beneath mulga trees’.
    My Hunting Country by Yvonne Ngwarraye Bonney

  • Grounded Kultcha – a Parrtjima favourite – is back for 2021: a vibrant sequence of animated artworks projected onto the ground, inviting kids to play with them. This year’s batch features seven artists from three different arts centres in the Central and Western Desert region. The work pictured here is by Jennifer Mintaya Connelly Ward, depicting Kungkarrakalpa Tjukurpa, or the Seven Sisters dreaming story. As with each installation, the soundscape comes from Dobby, aka Rhyan Clapham: a young Filipino and Aboriginal musician, MC and producer.
    Kungkarrakalpa – the Seven Sisters Story by Jennifer Mintaya Connelly Ward

  • The Revolving Kultcha installation at Parrtjima takes the forms of shields, coolamons and skateboards, and lights them up with art by Aubrey Tjangala (Papunya Tula Artists), Rita Wilson (Ninuku Arts), Raymond Walters Japanangka, Jungala Kriss and Margaret Kemarre Turner. Following cultural protocol, the shields only feature artwork by men and the coolamons artwork by women – but the skateboards, which represent the next generation, are up for grabs.
    Revolving Kultcha installation at Parrtjima

  • Margaret Kemarre “MK” Turner is a respected North Eastern Arrernte (ayerrere ikngerre) elder and a cross-cultural advisor, translator and teacher; she received the Order of Australia in 1997 in recognition of more than four decades fighting for Aboriginal rights. Turner is pictured here with her work Keeping the Land Clear, illuminating a coolamon in the Revolving Kulcha space.
    Keeping the Land Clear by MK Turner

  • Carved spears and digging sticks from Uluru’s Maraku Arts collective are gathered at either end of an immersive arc of light tubes spanning 20 metres. Titled Landing Kultcha, this installation is accompanied by artist narrations and a soundscape by Dobby.
    Landing Kultcha

  • The Parrtjima centrepiece is Spirit Kultcha: a light and sound show projected across two kilometres of the MacDonnell ranges, designed by Parrtjima creatives in collaboration with the reference group. Visitors sit in a stand to watch the six-minute piece, which has been soundtracked by electronic duo Electric Fields’ unreleased song Lore Woman.
    Spirit Kultcha
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