Painting movement at Papunya 1971-75 one of the few positive offshoots of the Government's Assimilation Policy. Senior men began to paint on boards and made murals for the school, initially showing sacred secret material, later self-censored. Paintings use complex patterning and dotting to describe formation of land by Ancestors, natural features and travel.
Jujurrpa is a Warlpri word meaning Dreaming and it is the Dreamtime stories that are depicted on the canvases of a group of Warlpri, Pitjantjatjara, Luritja and Anmatyerre women from the Alice Springs area.
The Pitjantjatjara share a common heritage with Anangu (Aboriginal people) throughout the vast Western desert. They use the same rich vocabulary of visual symbols that has now become well known through the work of the Papunya Tula artists.
"From the time that whites arrived in Tasmania and up until 1983 Aboriginal performing arts especially theatre arts, had become almost as extinct as whites would have people believe Tasmanian Aborigines were. Not so!"
"How many people still think that up north or in the centre is the only place for real Aboriginal art. You know when you work with it, selling it, buying it, you hear it all the time."
In 1989, Jon Altman, Chris McGuigan and Peter Yu were asked by the Minister for Aboriginal Affairs to look into the viability of the Aboriginal Arts and Crafts industry, to point to ways to improve its efficiency and effectiveness and to advise which government programs could give cost effective support to the industry and to recommend managing and marketing strategies.
The Power Institute at the University of Sydney ran a 10 week program devised by Susan Simons and Bronwyn Bancroft of panel discussions, presentations, films/videos and seminars exploring many of the issues of Aboriginal art in Australian society.