INDIGENOUS ART

Similar to being in Adelaide or Cairns, one is much more conscious of the traditional owners of the land in Perth. There are just more people to be seen. This is Noongar country or boodja although they weren't words we knew when we were growing up. We weren't taught the stories of warrior Yagan or the about the sacred sites around the Swan River let alone the land-grapping massacres that continued in WA into the 1920s.

So far, because it's been Festival time, we have seen indigenous art at various galleries, experienced the food choices of the Kimberley tribes, watched the story of the Warumpi Band. We've subscribed to Yirra Yaakin, the local indigenous theatre company and bought some art, one sublime and one practical.

The sublime piece was from Artitja Fine Art, owned by our friends Anna and Arther. I was perusing the e-catelogue for their current exhibition WARLUKURLANGU The Art of Yuendumu and was strangly attracted to a Seven Sisters dreaming painting by Athena Nangala Granites. I rushed down to South Fremantle to see it and fell further in love with a different painting by the same artist. It's full of colours that I wouldn't normally be attracted to - pinks and apricots and purples - so who knows where it will hang in our new home but it is a stunning piece of art.



The practical piece of 'art' that we've purchased is to save our pink skins from the harsh sun of the west. There's a nice irony, I think, in buying a beach shelter with an indigenous design. After all, those of us with Anglo-Celtic heritage don't belong to this land even though we live it.  But the art of the traditional owners will help protect us. Our shelter is practical - light to carry, easy to put up - and with a beautiful design of a rock hole and water souces near Lake Hazlett, WA of the Nampijinpa/Jampijinpa country painted by Alice Nampijinpa Michaels.




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