Senior Warlpiri Elders have reunited with two landmark paintings crafted nearly forty years ago in Yuendumu, a remote Aboriginal community 290 kilometres north-west of Alice Springs.

On Tuesday, the Elders viewed the works during a visit backed by the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies (AIATSIS).

The Warlpiri Project says the paintings were traded for a government-owned four-wheel-drive in 1986, giving the artists a way home.

Now known as Toyota Dreaming, the works were painted by Paddy Jupurrurla Nelson, Paddy Japaljarri Sims, Larry Jungarrayi Spencer, Paddy Japaljarri Stewart and Towser Jakamarra Walker.

The Warlpiri Project said the artists were among those who painted the Yuendumu School Doors, a defining project in the development of contemporary Warlpiri art.

Senior Warlpiri men painted the doors in the early 1980s to teach children about Jukurrpa, the law, culture and ancestral stories at the heart of Warlpiri life.

Warlpiri Project senior Elder, Robin Japanangka Granites, said the two paintings continued that work of sharing cultural knowledge.

"The paintings were done by the same artists who painted the Yuendumu Doors in the early 1980s," he said in a statement shared by the Warlpiri Project.

"They painted these masterpieces to help educate the broader community about our Jukurrpa, just as they did with the painting of the Yuendumu school doors for their children way back."

Researcher Eric Michaels, working closely with the Warlpiri at Yuendumu, helped broker the exchange, according to the Warlpiri Project.

Yuendumu now stands as an internationally recognised hub of Central Desert art.

The Warlpiri Project thanked AIATSIS for its ongoing support and care of the paintings.