Thelma Dixon - Women collecting bush tomato into a coolamon

Catalogue Number: 26/107

This painting tells a story of Aboriginal women working together to gather bush tomatoes, often found in spinifex country.

After a big rain, Aboriginal women from remote communities in Central Australia go out into the bush to look for the bush tomato plant, it has green leaves and tiny pink/purple flowers. Soon, green fruits begin to grow. When these fruits turn yellow, they are ready to eat, sometimes the fruit left in the sun turns brown and dried, this is still good to eat.

The smaller curved lines in the artwork represent the women sitting on the ground. They have their digging sticks beside them. The coolamons are wooden bowls used in the old days to collect food into. The coolamons in the corner of the painting are filled with ripe bush tomato.