Dreaming – the basis of Aboriginal Art

Dreaming is the centre of Aboriginal religion and life. To the Aborigines it is much bigger than the world of our nightly dreams.

It refers to a time at the very beginning of all things. In that time the world was formed into the world we know today.

The Aboriginal sacred stories are stories about what happened and how Ancestor Beings formed the land, and founded life on the land.

Hidden beneath the visible world around us. This unseen world is not distant and vague — it is more real than the visible world and provides the foundation on which this world rests.

By performing ceremonies which were first performed by ancestors, the power of it is again made present.

The songs, stories, symbols and rituals of the ceremonies activate and experience it.

Both personal and communal. An Aboriginal group may speak of it, with which they has been linked from the beginning, but each individual may also speak of my Dreaming.

This may include a story about a form of life with which I am connected — so mine may be connected with the kangaroo, the emu, the honey ant or some other form of life.

As an Aborigine, it connects me all the way back to the very beginning. Symbols would be depicted in the sacred art and objects used in the rituals.

It is reflected in a special way in the land. Ancestor Beings not only formed that land or were transformed into a part of the land; they are still present today.

They reside inside rocks, caves, waterholes, or some other part of the landscape; in this way the Ancestor Beings live on.

Sacred sites are those places where the power and the beings are close to the surface. An Aborigine may point to a mountain and say, that is my grandfather.

Aborigines reflect a constant awareness that they are in the presence of it wherever they travel, hunt, gather food or reside.

Not one belief among many it is the centre of all Aboriginal religion. Each Aboriginal group is linked with it and understands the identity derived.

These groups do not see themselves as nations or peoples created in the course of history; they are families, emerging from and still connected to the Dreamtime.

It is the beginning of all things, the unseen spirit world and the living landscape. It is the distant beginning present in the world today and gives order to the world.

Their sacred stories and songs are transmitted orally from one generation to the next. Drawings which depict the sacred stories and Ancestor Beings in symbolic form are found on cave walls, ceremonial boards, ritual stones or rock walls.