It's all about joining the dots

Tribal art from the central deserts of Australia is fast assuming a contemporary form, as is evident from an exhibition seen by Neha Bhatt.

The Warlukurlangu artists, they are dreamers. These artists — a collective from central Australia — hail from the ancient tribes of the deserts. One of the living communities, Yuendumu — and a few other settlements close by — have taken a shot at contemporary art. Their paintings, an extension of the traditional tribal art, has met with considerable success in the last couple of years, apart from their own country, also in the United States. Their work is now in India, with help from art collector Durga Vishwanathan, showing at the India Habitat Centre in New Delhi till the end of this week.

Two of the artists whose work is part of the show, titled Desert Dreamings, are in Delhi to accompany the exhibition. Otto Jungarrayi Sims, one of the artists, explains, “The paintings are Jukurrpa, meaning the stories we dream, that have been handed down from generation to generation for millennia. Every canvas you see here is a story related to our ancestral lands. Some of the stories might be alike, but the way they are expressed is different, unique to each person.” For example, an Untitled painting, a riot of bright colours, tells the story of a rock hole at Lappi Lappi, home to “warnayarra”, a rainbow serpent that travels underground between various rockholes. According to folklore, one day, as women gathered at the rockhole, with their children singing and dancing, the warnayarra heard the sound of voices and travelling silently towards them under the water, reached the end of the rockhole, rose and ate them all.

The canvases are extremely striking owing the use of bright colour — a fair bit of orange and red in particular — and each form shaped with dots. Otto Jungarrayi Sims explains that he likes to use the orange colour as the background of the painting because it’s striking and brings out the elements of the canvas well. Working around their traditional forms makes the work on display a unique blend of old, and new.

“We use age-old iconography to depict forms, people, animals, nature and objects. Our ancestors used to paint their bodies, and paint rocks, using natural colours. Now that we have access to art supplies, we use sticks and brushes, and an unrestricted palette of modern acrylics,” says middle-aged Sims, whose father too is part of the Warlukurlangu Artists collective. Sims is in India with his wife Ormay Nangala Gallagher who paints part-time and is a teacher by profession.

The work of 43 tribal artists that is on exhibit has been commissioned by Warlukurlangu Artists Aboriginal Corporation, an organisation that essentially works as a not-for-profit, fully indigenous-owned, artists cooperative. Cecilia Alfonso, the manager of this cooperative, points out that the art has been the first significant contact urban Australia has had with aboriginal culture. Many of the tribal settlements have been painting for centuries and each of them has their own style,” she says. Animals, and animal tracks, are an important part of what they paint, Alfonso explains, because till 50 years ago the tribes were mainly hunters and gatherers. “Notice the kangaroo tracks. They have been painted the way you see them on ground.”

But the paintings should not be dismissed as merely a narration of a tale especially because they carry forward information that’s valuable to understanding the community. They are educational, often in keeping with the laws prescribed in their society; a conservative, structured tradition. The artists, however, are aware that what they now paint is aimed at a more liberal, audience, and have, therefore, introduced modern elements that are of celebration and merry-making.

Makes sense. After all, those are universal elements.