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RINGY'S RAMBLINGS: The art of the possible
Issue 136 - 23 Aug 2007
Issue 136, August 23, 2007: At the 24th Aboriginal Art Awards, GRAHAM RING wonders if the denizens of Canberra's morally moribund house-of-stoush couldn't benefit from a dose of the artists' integrity and imagination.
Three and a half metre crocodiles are a big hit in Darwin. When such a beast weighs in at 650 kilograms, the story is all the more newsworthy.
At the 24th Telstra National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Awards earlier this month, judges Djon Mundine and Fiona Foley were captivated by just such a specimen.
Ubirikubiri, a cast bronze crocodile, snapped up the top prize of $40,000 for Torres Strait Islander artist, Dennis Nona, a Badu Island man.
The inspiration for the piece is a legend from the Mai Kusa river, on the western coast of Papua New Guinea.
It seems that old Ubi was a neglected family pet who conclusively demonstrated his annoyance at being denied food while his carer visited a neighbouring village.
On his keeper's eventual return, a peeved and peckish Ubi made a meal out of him. A croc is not just for Christmas.
At a time when Northern Territory Aboriginal communities are under attack from an ideologically-driven federal government, the maintenance of culture is more important than ever.
Indigenous Australians are familiar with dispossession and deprivation. But if their land is to be stolen all over again then the culture will remain resilient.
The breadth of work on display at the art awards is your proof. From traditional bark paintings through barbed-wire emus to audio-visual exhibits, it was all there.
Culture grows and changes.
One day, jaundiced judges of native title claims who rule that continuous connection with land has been lost because people use outboards instead of oars, will also come to this conclusion.
My technical knowledge of Indigenous art is not all that flash. But - as they say in the classics - I know what I like.
And I like the Big Mob of Tjanpi Dogs. The Tjanpi Desert Weavers from Ngaanyatjarra and Pitjantjatjara country have constructed a clever and cute collection of camp dogs which, for me anyway, is a howling success.
The first rule of remote communities seems to be that you can't have too many dogs. Companion animals, hunters and general camp mutts add considerably to the colour and movement factor in most settlements.
While the dogs have their downside, it's great to see them represented here in such a fun way. A sense of humour is both a cloak and a weapon in the hands of oppressed peoples.
In Canberra, it's more about artifice than art. The kind of creativity being demonstrated in this part of the world is of a distinctly down-market variety.
It's an election year, you see, so integrity has had to be jettisoned in favour of short-term, superficial electoral popularity.
The Howard government pulled a cheap political stunt by promising Indigenous Territorians the milk of human kindness, and Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition lapped it up.
Loud chants of 'me-too, me-too' coming from the ALP benches drowned out the clear and cogent criticisms being levelled by more principled types from the Greens and the Democrats.
The Prime Minister's 'intervention' imposed marshal law on half of Clare Martin's Northern Territory fiefdom.
Martin had earlier squandered her entitlement to make political capital out of her government's admirable decision to commission two highly competent people to examine the horrors of sexual abuse of Aboriginal children.
Pat Anderson and Rex Wild delivered their recommendations and Martin promptly sat on them.
The PM used this procrastination as a tissue-thin pretext for his 'intervention'.
Incredibly, Martin has still to formally respond to the Little Children are Sacred report.
When she finally does so at the next sitting of the Territory Parliament, she will be pilloried afresh by the federal government for showing all the acumen of a rabbit caught in the headlights.
In a risky blame-shifting strategy, Martin is now jabbing her finger at her federal comrades in an effort to fit them up for this crime of silence.
While no-one in the ALP will emerge from this sorry charade with any credit, it was Territory pollies Warren Snowdon and Trish Crossin who had at least pointed at the elephant in the room.
Artists, like those exhibited at the Aboriginal Art awards, are renowned for their courage, integrity and willingness to put principle ahead of pragmatism.
These qualities are currently in great demand amongst those whose hands now tremble on the tiller of the ship of state.
We could do a lot worse than send a plane load of painters to fill the moral vacuum which has emerged in Canberra.
ringy@nit.com.au
* Graham Ring is a writer and columnist for NIT, based in Alice Springs in the Northern Territory.
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