The Importance of Aboriginal Art

Namadira and the early Yurikala artists found a way to speak across the cultural divide. They are concrete evidence that even the most appalling passages of our country's history are scattered with discrete examples of meaningful rapprochement. Such works were never authentic in the way the term is used in primitivist circles where it is intended to designate something wholly untouched by non-indigenous worlds. There is a difference, one that comes down to the economics of Aboriginal art. Namad Jira made significant money from his paintings but it wasn't until the early 1980s that talk of a bona fide Aboriginal art market truly took hold. The idea that a culturally based art form might