WAC161/25 – Troy Drill

– 80 x 100 cm

This is a unique bush style artwork created with traditional ochre sourced from Gija Country and bush grass.

Emerging artist Troy Drill breathes life into ancient storytelling with The Kangaroo Fat Dreaming Hills, a powerful artwork inspired by his on-country artmaking with traditional ochre and grass. This work reflects the deep wisdom of the land, passed down through generations, where every hill, rock, and tracks hold the echoes of Dreamtime stories.

The finely carved lines ripple across the painting like the movement of wind over the hills, mapping the sacred story of the Kangaroo Fat Dreaming. This is no ordinary tale it is one of knowledge, survival, and the intimate relationship between people, animals, and the land. The lines symbolize the markings left on the rocks, guiding the way for those who know how to read them. They whisper of a time when an old man, a skilled hunter, set out into the vast bush searching for Kangaroos, as he walked, he read the land like a living book.

When he reached these hills, he saw the signs, the way the earth was shaped, the way the lines curved and cut through the stone. These markings told him kangaroos had passed through, leaving traces of their presence. He understood that the fat of these animals, highly valued for sustenance and ceremony, was hidden within the landscape itself, waiting to be found by those who knew its secrets. The same lines that revealed the kangaroo’s path also led him to the hunting dingo, a companion intertwined with his journey, just as the land and its creatures are woven together in an unbroken cycle.

Troy Drill’s artwork mirrors the natural patterns found in rock engravings and ochre paintings, capturing the timelessness of these stories. The stark contrast of black ink on paper brings forth the bold essence of the Dreaming, where past, present, and future are inseparable. Through this work, Troy invites us to see beyond the surface, to read the land as the old people did, and to listen to the stories held within the hills.

Kangaroo Fat Dreaming Hills is more than an artwork; it is a map, and a tribute to the enduring power of culture and connection to Country.