Australian Art

What are common stylistic features of Aboriginal Art? Essential Question What are common stylistic features of Aboriginal Art?

EOA and POD

Key Term Australia – A country and continent in the Southern Hemisphere.

Geography The commonwealth of Australia consists of the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and numerous smaller islands around the mainland. Australia is the world’s largest island and smallest continent. The Barrier Reef is the largest coral in the world. The vast interior is called the Outback. A large part of the continent is dry.

History Australia was sighted by Europeans in 1606. In 1770 James Cook mapped the east coast of Australia, named New South Wales and claimed the land for Great Britain. The British Crown Colony of New South Wales was formed in 1788 and became a penal colony (a place prisoners were sent).

Aborigines Australian and Tasmania were inhabited by indigenous Australians for about 50,000 years before European settlement in the late 18th century. The Indigenous population estimated at 350,000 at the time of European settlement declined steeply for 150 years following settlement due to infectious diseases. Aboriginal Peoples create art as a way to reclaim their loss and share their histories with future generations.

                          Key Term Aborigines- An original inhabitant of Australia.

Dreamtime Aboriginal art dates as far back as 50,000 years ago. Their imagery relates to the Dreamtime. The Dreamtime is the time of creation whose stories explain how the landscape was made by super beings. Along with the Dreamtime stories, the rights to paint specific images from them, are past down from generation to generation.

Dreamtime A Dreaming is a creation story owned by different tribes and their members. Painted ceremonial dreamings are passed on by gender – a daughter, by tribal law, is not allowed to see male tribal ceremonies so they paint different stories passed down through their maternal line.

Rock Art The earliest works are drawings and carvings on rocks. In some areas of Australia, Aborigine artists still make their own paints and brushes.

Rock Art It is the longest continuously practiced artistic tradition in the world. North Australia, has very impressive rock paintings.

Key Term X-Ray Painting-                           Key Term X-Ray Painting- a manner of depicting animals by drawing or painting the skeletal frame and internal organs.

X-ray Painting The "X-ray" tradition in Aboriginal art is thought to have developed around 2000 B.C. and continues to the present day. The X-ray style depicts animals or human figures in which the internal organs and bone structures are clearly visible.

X-ray Painting X-ray art includes sacred images of ancestral supernatural beings as well as works depicting fish and animals that were important food sources. Aboriginal painters express their ongoing relationships with the natural and supernatural worlds.

                          Key Term Papunya Art- A group formed in 1972 that is owned and operated by Aboriginal people from the Western Desert of Australia. The group is known for its "dot painting".

Papunya Art Papunya Tula is an artist group formed in 1972. This Western Desert Art Movement is known for “dot painting”. It represents Aboriginal art in Central Australia. Different regions have different styles. Complex dotting and over-dotting styles which have developed since the 1970’s are a means to hide the sacred stories in the paintings.

Dot Painting Traditional dot paintings were made in the sand. Contemporary dot paintings are on canvas with acrylic paint.

Art Materials Ochre was the most important painting material. It is a crumbly to hard rock heavily colored by iron oxide. It is pale yellow to dark reddish-brown. Red ochre symbolizes the blood of ancestral beings. Paints are made by grinding the rock into power then mixing it with a blinder (glue), such as saliva, kangaroo blood, or more commonly now, an acrylic binder.

Symbolism: Colors Black: The color of Aborigine people and night. Yellow: Sacred color. Color of the sun. Red: Color of the land and for blood. “We are all of one blood, from the land we come and to it we will all return” White: Spirit color; smoke, wind and lightning.

Symbolism

Symbolism

Video Video- Aboriginal Art. The Men of Fifth World