Inawantji (Ina) Scales

Inawantji Scales is a Pitjantjatjara speaker from Pipalyatjara in the APY Lands, South Australia. A translator, interpreter and language educator, she has delivered cultural awareness training through her private consultancy since 2007.

She also helped create the emerging leadership program through the Empowered communities, and is now a board member of NPY Women’s Council and director and Kulintja Kutju of the tri-state Empowered Communities board of directors.

She is a manager at Indigenous Engagement at voyages in yulara. She supports Anangu to get into jobs in Yulara resort and supports young people to complete the National Indigenous Training academy attaining a Cert III hospitality.

Inawantji’s words – I come from a lineage of Pitjantjatjara artists. My grandmother, Kuntjiriya Mick, helped establish Irrunytju Arts, and my mother, Josephine Mick, is an artist in her own right. Who is on the board of Ananguku Arts, Now my younger sister is becoming famous, artist Sally Scales

I first painted at eight, guided by my mother as we depicted Tjukurpa from my grandfather’s country, Kunytjanu and Aralya , south of Pipalyatjara.

Visiting these sites, hearing stories, and experiencing inma shaped my connecon to painting.

Painting grounds me. The rhythm of dipping a sick into paint and onto canvas calms my anxious heart—it is form of meditation