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The region has been occupied by people for
at least 50 000 years and the evidence of occupation and
art is the oldest in the country (see How
old is Australia's Rock Art?). Art and cultural traditions
of great strength continue to the present day. There has
also been a long tradition of contact and connection with
outside cultures, through visits and trading with sailors
from South East Asia. This is reflected in a number of
ways, including the appearance of Macassan boats and figures
in art images and more recently the incorporation of European
influences into traditional iconography by artists who
have taken up Christian beliefs alongside their traditional
culture.
The adoption of different materials and
techniques by Arnhem Land artists has also varied. Artists
from Yirrkala, for example, have consciously adopted
the discipline of working strictly with traditional materials
and a palette of four natural colours. Other communities
have taken an approach using modern materials, such as
replacing bark with paper and making use of acrylic materials,
while others again have taken an even freer approach (for
example from Ngukurr) using acrylics and screenprinting
inks on canvas.
However, while it is appropriate to recognise this diversity,
overall there is a unity of style and imagery about much
Arnhem Land art that derives from the long tradition by
artists of painting clan patterns and images on rock,
on bark and wood, on their bodies and in ground paintings.
Images from Arnhem Land are unmistakable and have a strength
that grows on viewers the more they are exposed to them.
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Arnhem
Land
