Tarku Rosie Tarco paints out of the Mangkaja Arts Center at Fitzroy Crossing, Western Australia. She is the full sister of Pijaju Peter Skipper. Tarku Rosie has an exhilarating palette and paints the vast expanses of the life and plants of her country, the Great Sandy Desert. Like many of her contemporary painters at Mangkaja, one dominate theme both visually and subjectively is the waterhole. Tarku Rosie was born at a soakwater called Payinjarra in the Great Sandy Desert.

"I was born at a soak water called Payinjarra in the Great Sandy Desert. I walked out from the desert when I was young. I left my mother and brother, Peter Skipper behind at Japirnka. I left with my husband; I was only a young girl. My husband had two wives, me and my older sister. These two passed away a long time ago, here in the river country at Brooking Springs Station. When we left the desert we walked for a long time, it was a long way. We were walking and hunting. We killed pussycat and wirlka (sand goanna) but no kangaroo. We killed them to eat. I was walking, all the time worrying about my mother but I kept going. My husband and my sister were both cheeky; they hit me for no reason. I was crying for my mother. I got away from them once, they were too cheeky to me and telling me “come on you have to go”. I told them “No, I want to go back to my mother”, they kept telling me “No, you have to keep going”. I was frightened.

I came out (from the bush) at Old Bililluna. There were planes landing right there, I was frightened of that plane. From there all of us kids went walking and looking at the plane that had landed. We were looking at it. I didn’t know any English; I just looked at the kartiya (Europeans). We kept coming and we saw kartiya getting water in a bucket from a well. This was new to me too, it was the first time I had seen this. We had no shoes; we were wearing yakapiri (bush used to make sandals to protect feet from hot ground). I talked only Juwaliny when I came; today I speak Juwaliny, Walmajarri, Kriol and English. After that, a motor car came from Moola Boola to Old Bililluna and took us to Moola Boola. We came out there, frightened in the car, we hadn’t seen one before. We didn’t know anyone there either. I met Daisy Andrews there, she had her first son, and I met her there with her son. I didn’t know her before then. They put dresses on us, we came no clothes." --Tarku Rosie Tarco

IA striking painting by Tarku Rosie rendered in complimentary colors providing a dramatic chromatic contrast of trees and spinifex country in the Great Sandy Desert where she was born.

Language: Walmajarri

Country: Payinjarra, Great Sandy Desert

Date of birth: c. 1932

Group Exhibitions

2006 -- Depth and Divergence, Cullity Gallery, UWA, Perth

2005 -- Women’s’ Show ,Gallery Gondwana

2005 -- Short on Size, Short St. Gallery, Broome

2005 -- Mangkaja Artists, Boutwell Draper Gallery, Sydney

2005 -- Mangkaja Artists, Gladfly Gallery, Perth

2005 -- Too much good work, Raft Artspace, Darwin

2004 -- Tarku & Murungkurr, Gadfly Gallery, Perth

2004 -- Mangkaja Group Representation, Raft Artspace at the Melbourne Art Fair

2004 -- Mangkaja Group Exhibition, Gadfly Gallery, Perth

2003 -- Fitzroy Fusions, Raft Artspace, Darwin

2002 -- Short on Size, Short St Gallery, Broome

2001 -- Short on Size, Short St Gallery, Broome

Publications

2005 -- Mangkaja Artists Exhibition Catalogue, Boutwell Draper Gallery, Sydney

2004 -- Mangkaja Brochure For Melbourne Art Fair