1. The Aborigines, Australia’s native people, have the oldest continuous civilization in the world. The Aborigine’s culture, traditions and art are more than 40,000 years old!!! Aboriginal art is very interesting. Much of the art is naturalistic. Kangaroos, crocodiles, snakes, lizards, fish and birds are popular subjects as well as trees and shrubs and other things that appear in nature. Other popular subjects are mimis- spirits from the “dreamtime”. Elaborate random patterns are also popular as well. These may be painted on cave walls, on large pieces of bark, on didgeridoos, boomerangs, shields and bullroarers. Outlines of hands are also commonly seen. They are made by placing the hand against a cave wall and then spitting paint at the hand until an outline is created. There are 2 major styles in Aboriginal art. The first is the X-Ray style. In this style, animals are shown with their internal organs and bones exposed. Dot style art is composed of many small dots of different colors that make up a picture. Your Project: create a piece of artwork similar to that of Australia’s Aborigines using one of the following subjects. Australian Animal - you may use either the X-Ray style or the Dot Style Mimis, Random Patterns, or other natural subjects - use the dot style Hands - use blown, sprayed or spattered paint Size - larger than 8 1/2 x 11 up to poster board size Materials - you may use colored pencils, markers, crayons (don’t use crayons), paint (paint is really good!) construction paper, cloth or melted wax. Much aboriginal art is painted on stone or wood so have a dark back ground or use material with a dark background (you might even use stone or dark wood). Grocery sacks would also be a very good background. Matting your artwork or affixing it to a piece of poster board would make your project even more attractive. Grading - grading will be highly subjective! Attractiveness, neatness, creativity, originality, faithfulness to aboriginal art, perceived difficulty and perceived effort will all be taken into account. Remarkable projects will receive high scores, mediocre projects will receive low scores. A squiggly line drawn in red crayon on a piece of copy paper will receive no points and be returned with a frown. Points - This assignment will be worth up to 50 points. Remember, only extremely well done projects will receive the full score!!! Other info - No work will be done during class. This will be done entirely on your own time. No materials will be provided. Please understand that I will keep some of the assignments and that they may be displayed. Hints - remember that aboriginal art has very little empty space. Pictures of animals are often surrounded by random patterns. Ensure that your projects has very little empty space. You may use the internet to find other examples of Aboriginal art. Good Luck! Deadline - all projects must be turned in no later than _____________________ Projects turned in after this date will not be accepted and will receive no points. Mr. Kellner Extra Credit Project Australian Aboriginal Art