A home without art will always feel unfinished and empty. Choose not to add any artworks, and you risk living in an abode with an interior décor that feels anything but your own. Art is here to help you breathe some life into it, adding much-needed personality, colour, style, and texture.
While there are various types of art you can choose to invite in, it’s the intricate indigenous artwork for sale that can make a difference, and enhance your living space with tradition, cultural identity, and history too. Different Aboriginal communities have different forms of expression and storytelling that they’ve preserved for ages.
Artists to this day follow these as a way to pay respects to their ancestors, and keep up with the tradition that’s said to be one of the oldest art forms. The beauty of these artworks is how diverse they are, and different regions have different symbols and styles, so there’s something for everyone. Whether you want something that’s more neutral, with earthy tones, or something more vibrant with colour, you’re sure to find it.
Naturalistic/X-Ray Style
This is the type that can be found in Northern Australia. Due to the way it’s created, depicting animals with anatomical features, kind of like you would expect to see through X-rays, that’s how this artwork got the name. Whether it’s bone frameworks, or internal organs, you can expect to see a lot of anatomical detailing in this form of storytelling.
Dot Painting
This type of indigenous artwork for sale, that you can find at specialised galleries and art shops, is characterised by the dots, hence the name. Often seen in Central and Western Desert regions in Australia, this is an art form that’s originated in the sacred ceremony designs and body painting. It was the 1970s Papunya Tula Art Movement that helped bring this art expression to the canvas.
The dots can be created with sticks ranging in thickness to draw from fine to bolder dots. Dots were mainly used to fill in certain designs that were meant to stay secret or sacred, hidden from the public. Later on, the artists did their own variations, merging the dot and drag style. Some like to adapt the technique nowadays, to turn it into a dabbing process, ending up creating more colour.
Wandjina
If you’re looking for something unique, the Wandjinas are perfect because they’re only found in the north-eastern Western Australia Kimberly region, unique to the Mowanjum people. The Wandjinas are figures depicted with large eyes (like the eye of the storm) and lack of mouth, something that’s purposely omitted so as not to make them too powerful.
Cross Hatching
Another type of indigenous artwork that was part of traditional ceremonial painting, it comes from Northern Australia, and is also known as Rarrk. Rarrk paintings are thought to have a lot of spiritual power. The fine-line cross-hatching the Rarrk is known for depicting sea creatures and reptiles, finely painted with the hair-like bristles from the stems of the reed, or even human hair.
Ochre
While ochre itself is a medium primarily, a type of clay, it became art form because of the need for this art to be translated to canvas, thus resulting in the ochre style too. Ochre specifically originates from Arnhem Land and east Kimberly, and is a type of clay that can be found in a range of colours, from red and pink, to yellow and white, and sometimes even blue.
This clay is then ground to a powder form, and mixed with egg, animal fat, or saliva, to turn it into a paint. White can also be used with other types of pigments, including plant pollen, human or animal blood, to form other colours and paints. This is one of the oldest paint used in Australia.
Bradshaw
The Bradshaw figures, otherwise known as Gwion but named after the Melbourne pastoralist Joseph Bradshaw who first discovered them, are depicted symmetrically, sometimes with detailed headwear that can often be very refined, if we consider the cone shapes and knots, as well as clothing and tassel elements.
Shown dancing or hunting, there’s a lot of controversy about them as they differ from other Aboriginal art that was found on rocks in Australia. Some groups of indigenous people even believe they predated the arrival of the Aboriginal people. Whichever the truth may be, this air of mystery makes this type of art even more inspiring and creative, perfect if you want to fill your home with a little dose of intrigue.
Moreover, now that you know about the basic types of indigenous art you can choose from, be sure to consider where you’d place the selected painting(s), and what the main colours are on that wall or in that room. If you want to create a striking effect that would change your interior, pick out something that differs from the colours of your décor. If not, then choose something that matches the main colours for a seamless and harmonious effect.
Australia Life Today 
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