Good morning,everyone.I've been invited to talkabout my research project into Australian Aboriginalrock paintings.The Australian Aborigines haverecorded both real and symbolic images of theirtime on rock walls for many thousands ofyears.Throughout the long history of thistradition,new images have appeared and newpainting styles have developed.And thesecharacteristics can be used to categorise thedifferent artistic styles.Among these are what we callthe Dynamic,Yam and Modern styles of painting.
One of the most significant characteristics of the different styles is the way that humans aredepicted in the paintings.The more recent paintings show people in static poses.But the firsthuman images to dominate rock art paintings,over 8,000 years ago,were full ofmovement.These paintings showed people hunting and cooking food and so they were giventhe name 'Dynamic' to reflect this energy.It's quite amazing considering they were painted insuch a simple stick-like form.In the Yam period,there was a movement away from stick figuresto a more naturalistic shape.However,they didn't go as far as the Modern style,which is knownas 'x-ray' because it actually makes a feature of the internal skeleton as well as the organs ofanimals and humans.