1. Aboriginal Culture
Australian Aboriginal culture includes a number of practices and ceremonies centered on a
belief in the Dreamtime. Reverence for the land and oral traditions are emphasised.
Language groupings and tribal divisions exhibit a range of individual cultures.
2. Sacred sites and Dreaming stories
In most stories of the Dreaming, the Ancestor spirits came to the earth in human form and as
they moved through the land, they created the animals, plants, rocks and other forms of the
land that we know today. They also created the relationships between groups and individuals to
the land, the animals and other people.
Once the ancestor spirits had created the world, they changed into trees, the stars, rocks,
watering holes or other objects. These are the sacred places of Aboriginal culture and have
special properties. Because the ancestors did not disappear at the end of the Dreaming, but
remained in these sacred sites, the Dreaming is never-ending, linking the past and the present,
the people and the land.
For Aboriginal people all that is sacred is in the land. Knowledge of sacred sites is learned
through a process of initiation and gaining an understanding of Aboriginal law. It is, by
definition, not public knowledge. This is why the existence of many sites might not be broadcast
to the wider world unless they are threatened.
3. The quality and variety of Australian Indigenous art produced today reflects the richness and
diversity of Indigenous culture and the distinct differences between tribes, languages, dialects
and geographic landscapes.
The emergence of 'dot' paintings by Indigenous men from the western deserts of Central
Australia in the early 1970s has been called the greatest art movement of the twentieth century.
Prior to this, most cultural material by Indigenous Australians was collected by anthropologists.
Consequently, collections were found in university departments or natural history museums
worldwide, not art galleries. That all changed at a place called Papunya and with what became
known as the Papunya Tula art movement of the Western Desert.
Today Indigenous art ranges across a wide variety of mediums from works on paper and canvas
to fibre and glass. The story of the way these art forms runs parallel to the history and
experiences of the artists themselves. It reflects customary trading patterns, a struggle for
survival and the influence of governments and churches.
4. Wood carvings are made using stone tools and they vary from swirling
spirals and rippling waves to zigzags and concentric triangles. The
carvings don't have dots, they're mostly linear, with lots of crosshatching. As abstract pieces of art, they show a great deal of complexity.
5. Tree carving was a practice specific to the Wiradjuri and Kamilaroi tribes of NSW, used to mark
sites of special ceremonial significance. Young men were given their own design as part of their
initiation into manhood. That design was then carved into the tree by artists using stone tools.
Many tree carvings were also used as grave markers, signposts for the burial sites of important
tribal members.
7. Ceremony and Ritual
Traditionally, when a person in Arnhem Land dies the body is
ritually painted with relevant totemic designs, sung over and
mourned. It is then taken to the deceased's clan land, and is
either buried or placed on a platform in a tree and left to
decompose. The bones are recovered later (this can be months
or even years later) and a hollow log ceremony is performed.
The different painting styles apparent in
groupings are related to the artists' social
groups (sometimes described as clans)
which link people by or to a common
ancestor, land, language and strict social
affiliations.
Boy in ceremonial
dress and with his
body painted at his
initiation ceremony.
8. Carvings and Trees
Artist Jimmy Wululu
working on a hollow log
coffin
A tree trunk, naturally hollowed out by
termites, is cut down, cleaned and, in
a ceremonial camp, is painted with the
clan's totemic designs. The bones of
the deceased are painted with red
ochre and, during special dances,
placed inside the log. The larger bones
and skull are broken before being
inserted. The coffin is danced into the
main camp, placed upright and the
final songs and dances performed. It is
then left to the elements, and the
burial cycle is complete.
9. Traditionally in Aboriginal culture, artworks were
produced for ceremonial purposes. Therefore, not
many original artworks exist today. The artwork is
steeped in spiritual significance about the land, the
creatures and spirits that inhabit it.
Thuuth Thaa'-munth (Law Poles)
by Ron Yunkaporta, 2009
Cottonwood, red ochre, pipe clay
Collection of Peter Sutton
10. Artist: Lena Yarinkura
& Bob Burruwal
Above: Dancing Belt
Right: Jamu (Dog) and
2 Bandicoots
Bob Burruwal’s Namarroddo spirit figures
(2005), associated with shooting stars.
Maningrida Arts and Culture.
Fashioned from string or paperbark, ochre,
human hair, or all of the above.
