Shifting worlds: post-contact rock art in Central Australia
A substantial quantity of rock art was produced in central Australia in the period following contact between the Indigenous population and Europeans in the latter part of the nineteenth and early part of the twentieth centuries. An analysis of the post-contact rock art assemblage indicates that, despite the abrupt disruption to traditional hunter-gatherer lifestyles, the Indigenous response to the European invasion in this region was more positive, resilient and creative than early historians assumed. Significantly, many elements of the precontact assemblage continued to be produced or reworked whilst the range of production techniques expanded. Innovations emerged with a number of older forms of representation being replaced by newer forms, a range of new subject matter was introduced, and new means of flagging identity were created alongside the old. Analysis of the post-contact rock art assemblage has demonstrated that Aboriginal people in central Australia were active participants in change, mediating their interactions with the intruders in innovative ways.
Book review: 'Aesthetics and Rock Art III Symposium: Proceedings of the XV UISPP World Congress' by Thomas Heyd & John Clegg (eds)
John Clegg sums up the papers published in the volume he co-edited with Thomas Heyd as an 'eclectic mooting of experts'. It is indeed a catholic collection of rock art papers – 11 in all – by Australian and international authors, enriched with perceptions borrowed from disciplines such as psychology and philosophy. While all were presented under the framework of aesthetics in rock art,the varied approaches evident in the papers demonstrates the broad scope of this topic as conceived by the contributors. Such approaches contrast with more literal interpretations of the term that define and limit the concept of aesthetics to the study of the effect of the physical properties of objects on the senses and the qualitative evaluation of those properties, or simply to a Eurocentric evaluation of skill or beauty.
Murujuga Marni - Dampier Petroglyphs: shadows in the landscape, echoes across time
The genesis for this thesis came out of the industrial development of the Burrup, one of the 42 islands of the Dampier Archipelago, located two thirds the way up the Western Australian coast, in a region known as the Pilbara. One of the major rock art areas in Australia and the foremost petroglyphs region, the Dampier Archipelago comprises arguably the highest concentration of petroglyphs in the world. It was to record Aboriginal archaeological culture as a member of the Dampier Archaeological Project team (under contract to Woodside Offshore Petroleum Pty Ltd) prior to the construction of the North West Shelf Venture Karratha Gas Plant, which brought me to the Burrup. It was this same company that established, many years later, the research scholarship that instigated this current study. Rock art is owned by the Aboriginal people of the area, and protected under state and federal legislation. Custodianship is held by Yaburara and Mardudhunera descendants, and Wonggoottoo and Ngarluma people. In the local Ngarluma language the Archipelago is known as Murujuga; the word for engraving and rock art is Marni (DAS 1979; Von Brandenstein 1973). Stylistic form, technique and subject depiction in the rock art of the Dampier Archipelago have been interpreted as demonstrable of a deep and rich antiquity. ... This thesis presents a revised model of the artistic traditions and their associated petroglyphs. The art is not painted on the rock surfaces but etched into it, nor are there suitable rock coatings which may provide a means of dating it. Through a combined use of superimposition, where one motif overlies another, and a five state reference of motif contrast condition (an index of weathering), I propose a temporal resolution. Analysis of 5,650 petroglyph sample recorded at 17 site complexes, consisting of ten locations on the Burrup and seven from five other islands, allows a relative sequence of the rock art production to be established.
More than the Motifs: the archaeological analysis of rock art in arid regions of the Southern Hemisphere
Three regional rock art studies undertaken in the southern hemisphere (northwest central Queensland in Australia, Lluta Valley in northern Chile and Quebrada de Humahuaca in Northwest Argentina) are analysed. Based on the relationships between rock art and other aspects of the physical, social and chronological context of its production, we show the articulation between the production of rock art and past social strategies. The three examples demonstrate many consistencies in the way rock art has been utilised in arid environments while also identifying regionally distinct variations in technique and function. In each of the arid regions, competition arose for limited and valued resources. In each example, the production of rock art was used as a powerful tool to negotiate newly arising circumstances in order to ensure predictable and desirable economic and social outcomes for the artists' group. The methods and form used to achieve these outcomes varied in each case study, because of the availability of materials for art production, the topography and environmental conditions in each specific area, particular cultural preferences and the ways in which people utilised art. In northwest central Queensland the rock art assemblage was employed for the negotiation of group identity at several levéis. In the Lluta Valley, the geoglyphs embody social, political and economical aspirations, being produced as a means of legitimating the access of lama caravans to the coast and its resources. In the Quebrada de Humahuaca increased competition for resources led to the production of different rock art assemblages; the herders produced panels that played roles such as marking grazing territories, commemorating past events and most significantly, as part of the ritual life of the herders.
Bedrock Flaking in The North Kimberley in Cultural Perspective
Associated Rock Art Traditions are surface modifications usually found in association with rock art. They are the product of repeated mechanical actions and usually lack the figurative elements of stylistic rock art traditions. While pecked cupules, fingerfluting, abraded areas, and abaded grooves are well documented both in the archaeological and ethnographic record, flaked edges have received limited recognition as an Associated Rock Art Tradition. This thesis will examine bedrock flaking as another example of an Associated Rock Art Tradition. Research was conducted in the northwest Kimberley where linear panels of bedrock flaking are abundant in association with rock art. Seventy eight sites were recorded across six (6) research areas, containing 1719 bedrock flaking panels from which 10,178 flake scars were recorded. Sites were classified as Quarry sites - abundant flaking debris; Ritual sites - limited flaking debris and rock art; and Other - limited flaking debris and no rock art. The analysis of variables from panels and flake scar measurements showed that Quarry sites were significantly different to Ritual and Other sites, containing a high quantity of larger flake scars. Ritual and Other sites were much harder to differentiate, containing flakes of similar dimensions but of varying stone quality and scar quantity. Other sites contained limited bedrock flaking panels and were interpreted as prospecting sites, where stone was assayed. Ritual sites had high numbers of bedrock flaking panels, but with much smaller flake scars than found at Quarry sites and very limited flaking debris. It is proposed here that bedrock flaking at Ritual sites represent an Associated Rock Art Tradition rather than an economic activity. The mechanical similarities between pounding and bedrock flaking may have led to these being viewed as closely related ritualised behaviours along with rubbing, hammering and incising which have been recorded ethnographically and archaeologically as Associated Rock Art Traditions.
Puntutjarpa rockshelter revisited: a chronological and stratigraphic reappraisal of a key archaeological sequence for the Western Desert, Australia
Puntutjarpa Rockshelter was the first archaeological site excavated in the Australian desert. Dug between 1967 and 1970, the archaeological sequence was originally interpreted as a continuous record spanning the last 10,000 years BP. With a new series of radiocarbon and OSL dates we show that Puntutjarpa primarily contains a mid-Holocene deposit with a veneer of last millennium material and a thin underlay of terminal Pleistocene evidence. We show that over the last 12.0 kyr, there were three discrete phases of site-use at Puntutjarpa – 12.0–9.7 kyr, 8.3–6.2 kyr and ~1.1–0 kyr – each with differences in the nature and intensity of occupation. This removes key field evidence for the ‘Australian Desert Culture’, a concept that has increasingly become an anomaly since the 1980s.