a Tula opts for soft earth colours, Western Desert Communities opt for strong primary colours.
Read More: Colours of Aboriginal Art
Are Aboriginal paintings maps of the land?
Aerial views are characteristic of desert Aboriginal art, allowing the artists’ imagination to hover over the country and observe both naturalistic forms of the landscape as well as metaphysical markings – these are the Songlines or Dreaming tracks laid down in the Creation time by the spirit Ancestors. Knowledge of water sources and locations of bush tucker may also be drawn onto these maps. Aerial views are characteristic of a hunter and gatherer society, who read the earth surface closely for signs of life, for tracking animals and recognising recent events.
Read More: Aboriginal Art and Landscapes
What role does art play in remote communities?
Contemporary Aboriginal art has been a stimulus for remote Aboriginal communities, in many places being the only business in small communities providing significant income to Aboriginal families. Aboriginal art has recognised the pre-eminent place of elders as the holders of traditional knowledge, and many of the most successful Aboriginal artists have been elders in the age group 60 to 80 years. The art movement has helped to strengthen culture in Aboriginal society by reinforcing the values of traditional knowledge, which forms the basis of Aboriginal art. Art and culture have always been part of the trading history of Aboriginal people, a reciprocal way of bartering knowledge as part of engaging with neighbouring tribes.
A broad range of paintings are being produced in hundreds of remote communities around Australia and by urban Aboriginal artists. Supporting Aboriginal art has an indirect effect in supporting the language and culture of Aboriginal families who chose to live in remote locations linked to their own ancestral lands. These groups are the largest contributors to art works seen in galleries and museums around the country.
Read More: Interviews with Aboriginal Artists
Why is Aboriginal art in both art galleries and museums?
Aboriginal art has found a way to be represented in both modern contemporary art collections as well as ethnographic collections. This has been a major part of its success in communicating with new audiences. While some elements of naturalistic depiction exist, particularly in Arnhem Land, the stylised representation and use of earth pigments has generally placed this in an ethnographic context. The desert artists’ use of symbolic abstraction has been the key to this work transferring into the modern contemporary art world, through a process that took several decades to mature. Today the notion of the oldest continuous living culture also being part of the most contemporary modern artistic output is a challenge to our ideas of contemporary Aboriginal culture.
Read More: A History of the Emergence of Aboriginal Art