STUDY GUIDE by Marguerite O’Hara, Jonathan Jones and Amanda Peacock
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A personal journey into the world of Aboriginal art A STUDY GUIDE by MArguerite o’hArA, jonAthAn jones And amandA PeAcock http://www.metromagazine.com.au http://www.theeducationshop.com.au ‘Art for me is a way for our people to share stories and allow a wider community to understand our history and us as a people.’ SCREEN EDUCATION – Hetti Perkins Front cover: (top) Detail From GinGer riley munDuwalawala, Ngak Ngak aNd the RuiNed City, 1998, synthetic polyer paint on canvas, 193 x 249.3cm, art Gallery oF new south wales. © GinGer riley munDuwalawala, courtesy alcaston Gallery; (Bottom) Kintore ranGe, 2009, warwicK thornton; (inset) hetti perKins, 2010, susie haGon this paGe: (top) Detail From naata nunGurrayi, uNtitled, 1999, synthetic polymer paint on canvas, 2 122 x 151 cm, mollie GowinG acquisition FunD For contemporary aBoriGinal art 2000, art Gallery oF new south wales. © naata nunGurrayi, aBoriGinal artists aGency ltD; (centre) nGutjul, 2009, hiBiscus Films; (Bottom) ivy pareroultja, rrutjumpa (mt sonDer), 2009, hiBiscus Films Introduction GulumBu yunupinGu, yirrKala, 2009, hiBiscus Films DVD anD WEbsitE short films – five for each of the three episodes – have been art + soul is a groundbreaking three-part television series produced. These webisodes, which explore a selection of exploring the range and diversity of Aboriginal and Torres the artists and their work in more detail, will be available on Strait Islander art and culture. Written and presented by the art + soul website <http://www.abc.net.au/arts/art Hetti Perkins, senior curator of Aboriginal and Torres Strait andsoul>. Islander art at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, and directed by Warwick Thornton, award-winning director of art + soul is an absolutely compelling series. Through ‘home Samson & Delilah (2009), the series offers a fascinating tour and away’, ‘dreams and nightmares’ and ‘bitter and sweet’, of the history and infinite variety of the work of Indigenous Perkins traverses the country and the heart and soul of artists. At the same time, art + soul provides a cultural and Indigenous art. political history of how Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island- ers have represented their country and their culture visually. Exhibition Over three episodes we meet many artists from all over Australia who talk about their art-making practice. Many of the artworks featured in art + soul are part of the Art Gallery of New South Wales collection and make up This series offers an opportunity to engage with some of the exhibition art + soul in the Yiribana Gallery (August Australia’s leading Indigenous artists, following Perkins as 2010 – June 2011). The AGNSW website offers information she visits remote communities and inner city studios. art + on the artists and their artworks and will screen the fifteen soul moves from warm, personal and humorous encounters webisodes made in conjunction with art + soul. There are between Perkins and the artists to intelligent and engag- additional short films on this website, including interviews ing analyses of each artist’s work. The artists featured in art with artists from the series. For more information on art + + soul represent the diversity of the Indigenous nations of soul the exhibition, see <http://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/ Australia; each was chosen for the strength and individual- exhibitions/art-soul>. ity they bring to their particular art-making practice. They embody the myriad art forms and shared concepts that bind book Indigenous artists and their communities together. To accompany the documentary series Hetti Perkins, in Each episode of art + soul is structured around one of three association with The Miegunyah Press in Melbourne, has themes – ‘home and away’, ‘dreams and nightmares’ and published a 300-page book also titled art + soul. This book, SCREEN EDUCATION ‘bitter and sweet’ – which provides a focus for engagement featuring essays, colour plates and artists’ interviews and with the ideas explored. In addition, fifteen webisodes, or biographies, presents Perkins’ journey through the docu- mentary series and across Australia. 3 warwicK thornton, ivy pareroultja anD lenie namatjira, rrutjumpa (mt sonDer), aRt + soul proDuction still, 2009, hiBiscus Films Curriculum Links and the audience, to develop an awareness of the cultural, environmental and historic context in which the work was art + soul offers an enriching and enlightening introduction created and to develop informed judgements about a range to the history of Indigenous culture and art practice in of artworks. Australia and is relevant for upper primary, secondary and tertiary students who are studying Visual Arts, Australian History and Politics and/or Aboriginal Studies. Key Concepts An engagement with art + soul is relevant for teachers and LanguagE groups students of Indigenous Australia – both Aboriginal and Torres Strait • Visual Arts Islander – comprises a network of communities commonly • Aboriginal Studies referred to as nations or language groups. Each group • Australian Studies is defined by language, even if today the language is • History not widely spoken. Over 250 different language groups1 • Politics and their respective countries exist across the Australian • Geography continent and outer islands and collectively constitute the world’s oldest living culture. Each language group is The series offers a new way of looking at Aboriginal and a sovereign nation, uniquely identified by its connection Torres Strait Islander art. It gives students an opportunity to country. Indigenous Australians are custodians of their to develop an appreciation for the complexity, strength and respective homelands – this responsibility has been handed beauty of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art and an down through countless generations. The colonial legal understanding of the diversity of Indigenous art practice. art fiction of ‘terra nullius’, or ‘empty land’, is redundant evident + soul also provides a detailed insight into the art-making in that each language group across Australia possesses and practice and processes of leading Indigenous artists while respects communal title to their country under Aboriginal teaching students about the personal histories of Indig- customary law.2 This connection with country is the enous people in Australia – the effects of colonisation, the foundation of Indigenous Australia, providing cultural and ways in which people have survived the colonial frontier, political strength. and how artists, since first contact, have expressed their continuing connection to country, their language, laws There are several maps of Aboriginal Australia available and culture. Students will be able to investigate how these online such as David Horton’s 1996 map at <http://www. SCREEN EDUCATION ideas and experiences are represented, to learn about the decs.sa.gov.au/corporate/files/pages/aboriginal_aust/ relationship between the artist, the artwork, their world ab_aust_full.pdf>. 4 rusty peters, sprinGvale station, 2009, hiBiscus Films RespEcting cuLturaL protocoLs creation, knowledge and spirituality. Language words As these programs contain images and voices of people for creation include Wangarr in Arnhem Land, Tjukurrpa who have or may have passed away, a warning text appears and Altyerr in Central Australia, and Ngarranggarni in the at the start of each episode to ensure that viewers are aware East Kimberley. Individual language groups’ creation and of what they may see and hear. You may already be familiar connection to country is continually celebrated and enriched with this disclaimer: ‘Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander through sacred and secular social activities such as viewers are advised that this program contains images and ceremony, song, story and art. voices of people who have passed away.’ country This warning adheres to a common Indigenous protocol of not circulating images and names of people who have The term ‘country’ in Indigenous Australia is all- passed away while the community is mourning their loss. encompassing and includes land and sea, the sun and Cultural protocols can been researched at <http://www. moon, plants and animals, fire and water, all of which australiacouncil.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0004/32368/ have been created by the epic journeys and actions of the Visual_arts_protocol_guide.pdf>. ancestors. Country, the physical and spiritual landscape, is the touchstone for Indigenous Australians’ cultural belief thE DrEaming system, and the physical topography of the landscape connects people to their ancestors. Country, infused with The era of Indigenous creation(s) is often termed the this sacred ancestral life force, continually determines ‘dreaming’ or the ‘dreamtime’, terms first coined by Frank culture and identity. People’s relationship to the ancestors Gillen (1875–1899) and the eminent anthropologist Sir determines responsibilities to country, culture and Walter Baldwin Spencer (1860–1929) during their field work community. with Arrernte/Aranda people in Central Australia, when they translated the Arrernte/Aranda word ‘Altyerrenge’.3 These self-detErmination Euro-centric terms are inherently problematic as they fail to recognise the complex reality and nuances of Indigenous This term refers to the rights of Aboriginal and Torres Strait cultural belief systems. The word ‘dreaming’ implies a Islander people to freely determine their political status and dream, a delusion or a non-reality, while ‘dreamtime’ implies freely pursue their economic, social and cultural develop- a