ANONYME

Digging Stick , c.1950

Art : Aboriginal
Origine : Autres / Others
Dimensions : 4,5 x 83 x 4 cm
Medium : Wood
Price : Nous contacter / contact us
N° : 4335

Daily life in the Aborigines provides a wealth of objects (baskets and trays, weapons, musical instruments) that combine cultural and aesthetic dimensions. This encounter is essentially due to the fact that many everyday objects also play a role in ceremonies in honor of the Dreamtime, and that this religious function implies a significant artistic re-elaboration: paintings, engravings and sculptures adorn and sacralize them. What is obvious in the case of Tiwi funerary poles or Arnhem Land totem poles, which have a religious purpose from the outset, takes on greater significance in the case of artefacts that are a priori utilitarian. This is the case with weapons (maces, boomerangs, spears, spear-throwers), whose function as fishing, hunting and/or warrior instruments is recuperated in a religious context, where they are used to (re)enact mythical battles, to magically anticipate the favorable outcome of a clan battle or game hunt, and to make the object a "totemic" object of veneration. This is also the case for agricultural implements, such as the digging stick. It is called by many different names by different aboriginal tribes (wana, kuturu or karlangu). An essentially feminine instrument, it is one of the attributes of women in Aboriginal representations, along with the coolamon (basket). It is thanks to these two elements that we can recognize the presence of women in the artists' paintings. The digging stick has several functions: digging, tracking, but also leaving traces in the sand (to recognize places, or as part of ceremonies). It's very practical and useful in all circumstances. As an everyday, all-purpose utensil, digging sticks are simply made. This one is just as simple: carved from wood, polished and painted with natural pigments. The multiple and common uses of these objects, as well as their manufacture (in wood), do not allow us to have very old pieces, this one dating from the 1950s.