Learning Art, Learning Culture: Art, Education, and the Formation of New Artistic Identities in Arnhem Land, Australia

Abstract

This chapter is an exploration of how art has provided such a meeting ground for culture, collectivity, and individual selfhood in a remote Aboriginal community in Australia. In Kunbarlanja ( otherwise known as Oenpelli or Gunbalanya), western Amhem Land, rock-painting-inspired contemporary art has assisted in the formation of contemporary social and group identities for Aboriginal men and women. From learning to paint under the guidance of rock artists, to using rock paintings as inspiration and artistically adapting rock painting imagery for a con­temporary audience, Kunbarlanja-based artists construct and renego­tiate their individual and group identities through the production of their own art and their rock art inheritance. The interplay between past and present in this place has important archaeological implications. It is important to state early in this chapter that my argument for a 'community' is based on the notion that a community is a condition in which individuals are enmeshed in a web of 'meaningful' relationships with others (Minar and Greer 1969; Poplin 1979). Thus, people are identifying as artists, are participating in an artistic community, and are the new protagonists in arguably the world's longest continuing artistic tradition.