Kunmanara Tjapalyi was a senior Yankunytjatjara woman. Her father’s country was Makirri near Fregon and her mother’s country was Iltur (Coffin Hill). Kunmanara lived nomadically in the area around Watarru for her early years, learning about the traditional way of life from her parents. When Everard Park station was established, rumours of the station managers handing out rations spread all the way out west to Watarru, and Kunmanara Tjapalyi’s family walked across to the area around present-day Mimili to see for themselves.

Kunmanara’s family continued to move around before they settled and found work at Everard Park station. Her father became a fencer, and Kunmanara Tjapalyi grew up on the outskirts of Everard Park Station before commencing work at the station herself, cleaning dishes, tending to the garden and looking after the children of the station managers. She met her husband, the late Jack Tjapalyi, in Mimili, and they had three children together; two sons and a daughter. Her son Litja and daughter Umatji still live in Mimili today, and Umatji has become a gifted artist in her own right.

Kunmanara had great knowledge of inma (song and dance ceremony) and continued to pass this on to the younger generations through her paintings and inma until the day of her passing. She began painting in 2010, and quickly became renown for her raw but figurative markmaking. In 2016, she was a finalist in the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Awards held annually at the Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory.