Contemporary Indigenous Art In Gordon Bennet's Notes To Basquiat

The Australian Indigenous community hold extremely significant corrections to the land of Australia, of which they refer to as ‘Country.’ Indigenous people acquire deep meaning from the land, sea and the countless resources derived from them. This special relationship has formed for many centuries. To them ‘Country’ is paramount for overall wellbeing; the strong, significant, spiritual bonds embody their entire existence. Knowledge is continually passed down to create an unbroken connection of past,

This work examines the past and also imagines the future by using references of past racial murders and the way they coincide with the present context and explore Australian Indigenous and non-Indigenous culture in the present-day. Ah Kee created this series of artworks in response to the apparent police cover up of the death of a young man in their custody, for protection of

Australia is a young, modern country made up of a diverse and multicultural population, therefore, it’s difficult to say that it has a single national identity. This essay will examine what Australia’s identity may look like, specifically, through art.

The identity of Australia as a place comes from both its physical features and the atmosphere, which is often created by its physical appearance. Three artists who have depicted the Australian landscape in different styles are Arthur Streeton, John Olsen and Sally Morgan. Streeton’s works are in a realistic but lively style typical of the Heidelberg school. He was intent on recreating the light and warmth of the land. Olsen and Morgan’s works, on the other hand, offer more abstract interpretations of the land. During the 1960s and 1970s, Olsen captured the essence and the energy of the landscape with his bold and bright brushwork whilst Morgan’s work from the 1980s portrays Australia from an indigenous perspective, which she achieves through her use of Aboriginal symbolism and cultural imagery.

Basquiat’s capacity to distill his perception of the outside world down to their essence, and project them outward through his art is what defined his unique style. He was capable of digesting complex social issues such as racial injustice or religion and unlock a more basic truth through his simple, thought provoking pieces. One of Basquiat’s most iconic pieces, Irony of the Negro Policeman deals with criticism of his own race. Because

The Navajo are centrally located in the Southwestern United States. Even though their culture is in America, it differs from the culture of Western America. The difference lies in everything from religion to personal expression. In fact, a significant portion of personal expression done by Navajo individuals is shown through their artwork. The artwork is a not only a representation of the Navajo lifestyle, but their significance to history. The Navajo artwork that will be discussed includes artforms such as sand painting, rugs, pottery, and silver making; these will be defined and the technique and/or creative process will be explained as well.

In Nancy Marie Mithlos essay, “No Word For Art in Our Language”. Mithlo explores the various reasons as to why American Indigenous art lacks an infrastructure and theoretical basis. Mithlo theorizes the reason Indigenous art lacks these necessary supports is due to three strategies used by the Native art community. Mithlos first theory discusses that the phrase “ No word for art in our language” perpetuates harmful behaviour within the Native community in the discussion of arts and stereotyping of Native art. Mithlos first example of why this is harmful is the original beginnings of the phrase from Jamake Highwater’s book “The Primal mind” wherein Jamake expresses his belief that because expression and experience is so ingrained in the native

His mother, who was something of an amateur artist herself, frequently took him to visit New York’s many art museums, and even enrolled him in a children’s program at the Brooklyn Museum of Art. Basquiat would later credit his mother with getting him started as an artist. Basquiat’s first artistic works were cartoon drawings, often of characters from Alfred Hitchcock films. Basquiat would sit beside his mother at night, drawing his cartoon sketches while she worked on her own designs.” From what I have researched I have learned that Basquiat and his father did not have a good relationship.

In the late 1900’s the art world became even more evolved from Impressionism, Fauvism, Futurism, and Abstract styles of art. Neo-Expressionism, a style of painting, and some sculpture, which emerged in the early 1980s, usually characterized by a return to figuration in expressive, gestural, and sometimes brashly aggressive works. This art movement was mostly associated with artist from New York like Julian Schnabel, David Salle, and Eric Fischl (Artsy.com). Of these artist there was one African-American, by the name of Jean-Michel Basquiat, genius of his time, and currently one of the world’s most renounced artist. His shaky upbringing along with his feelings towards situations in his personal life and cultural issues during is time,

Basquiat emerged in the period between Black Power and the contemporary scene, when entering the art world was still almost impossible for African American artists despite the passage of the Civil Rights Acts. Basquiat wanted to articulate the new position in which desegregated African Americans found themselves as inner cities crumbled and white flight accelerated. Even as laws prohibited intentional racism, racialization of American life continued. Basquiat attempted to bridge the post-soul aesthetic of hip hop's graffiti artists with the irony of contemporary American and African American art. Basquiat's deployment of irony, however, differed significantly from other African American artists. Not only did he question the unconscious racialization

Maymuru’s people lived a nomadic lifestyle, which is contrary to the central importance of Manggalili culture to land and country . Thus his art serves to merge their nomadic lifestyle to their clan’s strong belief in connection to the land. His practice was primarily painting on bark. This medium easily transported across the vast distances necessary to maintain a nomadic lifestyle. Maymuru’s work tells of the movements of the ancestral beings, especially the Guwak who travel with Marrngu to create lagoons and sand dunes of Maymuru’s homelands. In order to portray these lengthy narratives he divided his barks into schematic panels. Maymuru’s paintings are best known for their complex meaning and symbolism in which he used motifs such as crosses to represent his ancestors’ stories and connection to land. Maymuru saw art as a method to communicate ideas and knowledge to an audience outside his community so to widen understanding of Yolngu culture and to also educate the younger generations of Yolngu (The Yolngu are the indigenous Australian in North-Eastern Arnhem Land). In this way, Maymuru was ensuring the continuity of Yolngu ancestral law through his artworks.

Jean-Michel Basquiat was a writer, performer, and graffiti wonder in late-1970s New York, he had sharpened his mark painting style of over the top jotting, slippery images and charts, and cover and-skull symbolism when he was 20. Basquiat drew his subjects from his own particular Caribbean legacy. His dad was Haitian and his mom of Puerto Rican drop and a joining of African-American, African, and Aztec social histories with Classical topics and contemporary legends like competitors and artists. Frequently connected with Neo-expressionism, Basquiat got huge praise in just a couple short years, indicating close by craftsmen like Julian Schnabel, David Salle, and Francesco Clemente. In 1983, he met Andy Warhol, who might come to be a coach and icon. The two worked together on a progression of sketches before Warhol's demise in 1987, trailed by Basquiat's own particular inauspicious passing a year later (ARTSY, Web).

It all started off when Basquiat decides to leave home at 17 and head to lower Manhattan. The video stated that around this time everyone could be anything in New York, as if “young people where finding themselves”. And so, Basquiat wrote poetry or a form of quotes with the signature Samo, but it is not until he meets Maripol that he starts painting drawings. At this point he was living off the streets, so he sold post cards to support himself. He did not work at all the time he stayed at New York in fact he did try, but he said, “they were treating me as a slave”. Later, when people start buying his paintings, he would get angry when people criticize his artwork. I quite don’t understand him in this aspect because if I was an artist I would like to know what people like and dislike about my work. After the exhibit, P.S. 1

In this class, I was presented with an opportunity to reflect upon my personal knowledge of Indigenous

He uses acrylic and oil stick to give this painting, on canvas, a graffiti style, which certainly makes this artwork more conspicuous than other meticulously created portraits. Basquiat selects yellow as the background of the red handwritings and purple human figures, which are only composed of basic lines and dots. Everything is scattered all over the canvas and there are no patterns to abide by. However, it is the inconsistency created intentionally by the artist that evokes people’s awareness to the “Hollywood Africans” and how unjust those stereotypes are. He cleverly tricks us by challenging our traditional way of thinking by introducing the concept of the inconsistency of art. Interestingly, next to the portrait of Basquiat and his friend Rammellzee are short phrases and words which represent the stereotypes people hold against black Hollywood actors. Words like “gangsterism,” “sugar cane,” and “What is Bwana?” are all either crossed out or framed in squares. At first, I thought it was just a unique style that Basquiat adopts to make his artwork stands out. However, it turns out to be the complete opposite. “I cross out words so you will see them more; the fact that they are obscured makes you want to read them” (Basquiat, Hollywood African). Typically, people accentuate ideas by making them visually appealing and easily accessible, but the