Dreaming Their Way is a very impressive show. There are fine paintings by senior artists such as Emily Kame Kngwarreye, Kitty Kantilla, Queenie McKenzie and Eubena Nampitjin; bark paintings by Kay Lindjuwanga and Dorothy Djukulul; pieces by established artists such as Dorothy Napangardi, Makinti Napanangka, Ningura Napurrula, Gloria and Kathleen Petyarre; by urban painters Judy Watson and Julie Dowling; and rising stars such as Rosella Namok, Abie Loy Kemarre and Regina Wilson. In total, there are 78 works by 33 artists, drawn from a surprising range of private and public collections in the United States and Australia
What has made the work so startling is the notion that this is a form of contemporary art with roots stretching 50,000 years. At the preview the word on many people's lips was "authentic". Beyond all the contrivances and gimmicks of contemporary urban art, here was a living art, from the desert, embedded in age-old cultural traditions.
There is a lot of romance in this idea for audiences brought up in a nation that can be as insular as it is wealthy. The greatest challenge for the curators, Britta Konau and Margot Smith, is to attract a big enough audience for an unfamiliar proposition. The National Endowment for the Arts turned down an application for funding and it proved almost impossible to secure secondary venues. The next and last stop will be the Hood Museum of Art in New Hampshire, run by Brian Kennedy, formerly of Canberra.
The funding was cobbled together with contributions from the Macquarie Group, Qantas and a blend of Australian and local sponsors - though not the Australia Council, which seems to have run through its funds at the Musee du Quai Branly like a lottery winner in a casino.
There are special difficulties involved in bringing Aboriginal art to an international audience. How does one explain the concept of the Dreamings, so central to Aboriginal life and law? This idea encompasses past, present and future; creation stories and kinship. There is virtually no aspect of traditional Aboriginal life that stands outside the Dreamings.
Many would-be experts consider Aboriginal art too "ethnographic" to qualify as contemporary art. Then there are those who feel the movement is a contrived and artificial product, cashing in on ancient legends. There is a suspicion that the artists are acting out a marketing strategy dreamt up by their white minders. I recall critics in England in the 1990s saying they wanted to see "real" Aboriginal art, by which they meant prehistoric art that survives only on the walls of caves. It was like saying "real" French art ended with Lascaux.
Today's audiences tend to visit museums to learn rather than look, but perhaps the best way to appreciate Aboriginal painting is to momentarily forget the cultural complexities and open oneself to the visual impact of the work.
Taken on these terms, Dreaming Their Way is a very impressive show. There are fine paintings by senior artists such as Emily Kame Kngwarreye, Kitty Kantilla, Queenie McKenzie and Eubena Nampitjin; bark paintings by Kay Lindjuwanga and Dorothy Djukulul; pieces by established artists such as Dorothy Napangardi, Makinti Napanangka, Ningura Napurrula, Gloria and Kathleen Petyarre; by urban painters Judy Watson and Julie Dowling; and rising stars such as Rosella Namok, Abie Loy Kemarre and Regina Wilson. In total, there are 78 works by 33 artists, drawn from a surprising range of private and public collections in the United States and Australia, including those of Sydney collectors such as Liz and Colin Laverty, and Anne Lewis.
As a survey of Aboriginal women's art, one could hardly wish for a more representative selection or a more lucid presentation. Beyond the niche mission of the NMWA there are good reasons to concentrate on women's art because in many communities, such as Utopia, women have always been the dominant creative force. In the cluster of communities associated with Papunya Tula, women came late to painting, but injected a new vitality into a movement in decline. Nowadays, some of the most important indigenous painting is coming from women in remote outstations such as Kintore, 600 kilometres west of Alice Springs.
When one visits any settlement it's obvious that the women are the heart and soul of community life. A figure such as Regina Wilson is the matriarch of Peppimenarti, while Gloria Petyarre commands tremendous respect in Utopia. It's a fitting tribute to the position women hold in these societies that their work should be celebrated in this fashion.
Even if Dreaming Their Way doesn't attract huge audiences, it is making an indelible impression on visitors and the word-of-mouth factor will prove crucial as the show continues. We should perhaps be more alert to opportunities such as these, in which a museum and a group of curators are totally committed to the work, instead of being seduced by the flashy glamour of the Musee du Quai Branly in Paris. It is the difference between showing the art on its own terms and allowing it to be used as postmodern decor in an architectural afterthought.
It's a true blue month in Washington DC, because the Australian embassy is hosting a complementary exhibition of Aboriginal women's art called Painted Stories in its Gallery 1601, while a local commercial venue, G Fine Art, is showing installations by Fiona MacDonald and Susan Norrie. The dealer, Annie Gawlak, has been bold enough to follow her tastes rather than any safe commercial instincts. Introductions were made by Ron Ramsey, the Australian cultural attache, who also played a key role in both Aboriginal women's exhibitions. Welcome to the rapidly shrinking world of art, in which personal energy is more important than nationality.
Having said that, for a long time the latest thing in American art has also been the latest in international terms. The prosperity and power of the United States, the reach of its media and markets, makes this inevitable. If ever an illustration were required, one need look no further than the National Portrait Gallery, which reopened this week after a six-year hiatus. The gallery has been closed for an overhaul of gargantuan proportions. The bill comes to more than $US300 million ($400million), which is on a par with the Musee du Quai Branly. Half the funds come from the government, half from private sources.
The full name for this project is the Donald W. Reynolds Centre for American Art and Portraiture, incorporating the National Portrait Gallery and the Smithsonian American Art Museum. The two museums occupy the same building in a spirit of co-operation, with a careful allocation of gallery space to the most appropriate exhibits. Contemporary American art, for instance, is displayed in the high-ceilinged rooms at the top of the building, above galleries devoted to portraiture.
A few privileged Aussies were taken on a pre-opening tour last week by director Marc Pachter, who explained the subtleties of the project. The refit has been painstaking and detail-perfect. Every window, floorboard and tile has been lifted and refitted, or replaced. There are open storage facilities where one may view works not on display and an open conservation laboratory, where visitors may watch conservators at work. There are new cafes and auditoriums and a new ceiling designed by Norman Foster.
But the glory of any museum is its collection and the National Portrait Gallery has shown a high degree of skill and innovation in the way it has planned its exhibits. The procession begins with a group of contemporary works, featuring subjects who enjoy a celebrity that may or may not endure. To put this display together, the museum had to suspend a previous rule that stipulated a person had to have been dead for 10 years before his or her portrait could enter the collection.
There is a large, comprehensive display that charts the course of American history from the earliest days to the present, using coloured walls, well-chosen quotations and thematic displays to alleviate the sameness of so many painted faces. Even for someone like me, who knows little about the subject, it is an engrossing affair.
Elsewhere there is a display devoted to the poet Walt Whitman; rooms exploring issues of social justice; contemporary portraits in new media; the results of a national portrait competition that attracted 4000 entries, and - the cornerstone of the museum - the galleries devoted to the American presidents.
I tried to imagine a resplendent Edmund Barton at the entrance to the new National Portrait Gallery in Canberra, but somehow it didn't ring true. We may have to wait for the republic.