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Art, Culture and Ambiguity in Wilcannia, New South Wales
Author(s) -
Gibson Lorraine
Publication year - 2008
Publication title -
the australian journal of anthropology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.245
H-Index - 25
eISSN - 1757-6547
pISSN - 1035-8811
DOI - 10.1111/j.1835-9310.2008.tb00355.x
Subject(s) - ambivalence , ambiguity , scrutiny , denial , white (mutation) , aesthetics , sociology , work of art , history , art , political science , social psychology , psychology , law , philosophy , linguistics , psychoanalysis , biochemistry , chemistry , gene
The claim of most town whites that Aboriginal people of Wilcannia make art but have no culture and the claim by Aboriginal people of the town that their art work and art designs demonstrate their culture and cultural traditions opens up the powerful and productive dimensions of art and culture for closer scrutiny. In so doing, the ambivalence and ambiguity which saturates these categories is ethnographically revealed. How can the presence and production of artworks in Wilcannia and the white denial of culture be considered? Why indeed do these questions matter, in what ways do they matter, and to whom do they matter? How do the categories of traditional/remote, urban/settled and their avatars intersect with black and white notions of Aboriginal art and Aboriginal culture discursively and experientially?