This year, we have decided to take a further look into some of the amazing sights we saw on our Lap of Oz. First up, we have decided to take a look at the amazing Aboriginal Rock Art.
We saw rock art first at Carnarvon Gorge and then again at the West McDonnell Ranges and at Kakadu.
Aboriginal art is one of the oldest art forms and consists primarily of symbols. These symbols were used as a means of communication of their life, their rituals, and their customs.
At Carnarvon Gorge, a lot of the Aboriginal Art we saw was hand stencils and this is what we concentrated on today.
The Aboriginal people would mix crushed ochre, water and animal fat to make these hand stencils. Sometimes they used brushes they made from human hair, reeds or feathers, other times they would put this mixture into their mouths and blew across their hand which was resting on a rock surface.
The lower stencils were children’s and were made when they were very young. The higher up the stencils, the more more of the wrist and arm appeared and the more important the person was. Only the Elders had a stencil of their entire forearm on the rock wall.
To make your Aboriginal Hand Stencils, you will need:
- watercolour liquid paints, we used browns, reds, yellows and oranges with a hint of light green
- water
- spray bottles
- thick paper or card
Place some watercolour liquid paints in your spray bottles. Add a small amount of water, place the lid on tight and shake to mix.
Place your hand onto the paper and spray a couple of times. Carefully more your hand around the paper, spraying in different colours as you go.
Our boys wanted to do it themselves and as they are both right handed, they placed their left hands onto the paper and sprayed with their right hands.
You only need to spray about two quick bursts or otherwise you will get too much ink dripping all over your page, as we found out.
Once you have done one handprint, lift you your hand, wipe off the excess paint, (or this will run onto your page) and place your hand down on another part of the paper and spray again.
Continue until your page is covered with colourful hand stencils.
Leave your hand stencils art works to dry before using as wrapping paper, a print on your wall or any other way you choose.
Some great Resources are:
Review: Times Tales from Trigger Memory
Thank you so much for this excellent idea! I was looking for a preschool activity for VBS relating to Australia and how God created each one of us unique and special. Since we already had a ‘main’ craft I needed one that would take up the rest of the time without being overly complicated. This one is perfect!! Thank you again for putting it out there for everyone. BTW, do handiwipes clean up the hands or is soap and water necessary? TY
Thank you. We used soap and water as that is what we had. It would probably work with the wipes.