Shane's been in dozens of caves. He's never seen dots. So why are they the dominant Aboriginal visual language?
When Shane Smithers was adding traditional symbols to his mural, commuters passing by asked him, "What are you doing?!"Shane is a Dharug and Dharawal man who uses traditional visual language — the same symbols his ancestors used thousands of years ago.
"I'm quite confident that if one of my ancestors from this Country came and looked at my picture, they would be able to read what it says." "Often the concentric circles represent either a meeting place or a gathering place because there's stillness there or it's a pond or waterhole," Shane says. Shane says the vertical lines inside the rain man's torso represent rain falling. They are reproduced in his Parramatta mural."Look at this big guy! Very impressive. Like, you can't help but be impressed when you see that fella."Inside the figure's body are dozens of long vertical lines. "What have we got? Big long lines in him. Look," Shane says as he traces the grooves."They bring the rain, the rain nurtures the soil and the soil brings forth life.
"The men's painting shed at Papunya is without a doubt the most important studio in the history of Australian art," he says."When you're a kid, you draw the things that are around you, the things that you see," he says.However, Shane had been introduced to traditional visual language quite early, at sites like Rainman, so he knew that dots and circles were not his cultural heritage.
Cultural Misrepresentation Traditional Symbols Shane Smithers Visual Language
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