Australia holds one of the richest and most continuous rock art heritages on the planet. On rock shelters, gorge walls and in caves, generations of Aboriginal artists painted and engraved ancestral beings, animals, people and objects. Of all these images, few are as recognisable as the Wandjina of the Kimberley region in north-western Australia.
The rain beings
The Wandjina are ancestral beings linked especially to the Worrorra, Ngarinyin and Wunambal peoples. According to their stories, the Wandjina came from the sea and the sky, shaped the landscape, laid down the law and brought the rain and clouds that herald the wet season. At the end of their deeds they withdrew into caves and rock shelters, where they left their image on the rock.
For the custodians, then, a Wandjina painting is not a portrait: it is the Wandjina itself, present in that place. Damaging it or treating it with disrespect means offending a powerful being, capable of unleashing storms and floods.
An unmistakable iconography
Wandjina figures have constant features:
- a round white face, often very large in relation to the body;
- two dark eyes and a nose, but no mouth;
- a kind of halo or headdress around the head, interpreted as clouds, lightning or hair;
- sometimes an oval on the chest, read by some as a symbol linked to rain or to inner life.
The absence of a mouth has been the subject of many interpretations by scholars and outside observers. It is wise to remember that the full meaning of these elements belongs to the custodians, and that not all explanations are public.
Repainting to renew
One of the most interesting practices linked to the Wandjina is the renewal of the paintings. Traditionally, the people responsible for a site would periodically repaint the figures, refreshing their colours. The act had no aesthetic purpose but a ceremonial one: renewing the image meant renewing the strength of the ancestral being and, with it, the rhythm of the seasons and the fertility of country.
This practice challenges the Western idea of conservation, according to which an ancient painting should be left untouched. For the custodians an abandoned image, no longer cared for, is an image that loses life.
The Gwion Gwion figures
In the same region there are other, very different paintings: slender, elegant human figures adorned with tassels, belts, headdresses and hanging objects. The Ngarinyin call them Gwion Gwion, while older literature refers to them by the name of a European pastoralist who described them at the end of the nineteenth century.
Their dating and their relationship with present-day communities have long been debated by specialists. Some outside interpretations even tried to attribute them to peoples other than Aboriginal Australians, a claim that serious research and the communities reject. The Gwion Gwion are part of the heritage of the Kimberley peoples.
The X-ray style of Arnhem Land
Moving north-east, into Arnhem Land, one meets another famous tradition: the X-ray style. Fish, turtles, kangaroos and other animals are painted showing not only their outline but also the inside of the body: the backbone, the organs, the fat deposits. This style expresses a deep knowledge of animals both as food and as ancestral beings, and it has continued in bark painting.
The Mimi, the slender spirits
In western Arnhem Land there are also stories about the Mimi, extremely thin spirits who live in rock crevices. They are so slender that a gust of wind could snap them, which is why they come out mostly when the air is still. According to Kunwinjku accounts, it was the Mimi who taught human beings to hunt, to cook and also to paint on rock. Many paintings of slim, dynamic figures are attributed to them in local tradition.
How to look at rock art
For those who do not belong to these cultures, Aboriginal rock art calls for a specific attitude:
- Do not touch the paintings: even the oil from fingers can damage them.
- Visit only sites open to the public, preferably with Indigenous guides.
- Avoid reproducing images in commercial settings without the communities' consent.
- Accept the limit: some explanations are not meant for outsiders.
In short
- The Wandjina are ancestral rain beings of the Kimberley, painted without a mouth.
- For the custodians the painting is the very presence of the ancestral being.
- The periodic renewal of the images had ceremonial value.
- The Gwion Gwion and the X-ray style show the variety of Australian rock art.
- Looking at these works requires respect, caution and acceptance of secrecy.
