The Artists and Their Work

Extract

No one knows when or where Aboriginal painting began. There is some agreement that the Australian Aborigines came from a Veddoid ancestry originating in South India and Ceylon. Since the term Vedda is derived from the Sanskrit Vyadha, meaning a hunter or one who lives from the chase, we can assume that this also was originally a hunting culture. There is evidence that these hunters made paintings in caves, using ashes and turmeric mixed with spittle, possibly to bring success to their hunting. We can only conjecture, with no factual evidence, that the earliest migrants to Australia have brought this custom with them.

The Arnhem Land bark paintings evolved from pictures of fish, animals and people which the first inhabitants appear to have made in caves and rock shelters. We can assume that these designs of kangaroos, fish, and thin, sticklike spirits called Mimi were drawn for the same purposes as today: to depict the totemic ancestors so their help and support could more readily be invoked, to encourage game to reproduce and increase, to make magic, and to depict the limits or characteristics of the ‘country’ owned by a clan.