Australian hoaxes

[Grant Hughes]

Is art produced by native artists discernable from similar works by
non-natives?

Two recent confessions by acclaimed Australian artists posing as
Aboriginals implies that, at least in the case of Australian arts, the
differences may reflect image rather than substance.

"My Own Sweet Time" -- published as the autobiography of Wanda Koolmatrie
-- was actually written by Leon Carmen, a 47-year-old white man living in
Sydney (1). Last week, a well-known Aboriginal artists confessed that she
was of European descent.

My question is two-fold: Do Aboriginal artists posess unique qualities
that can be discerned in their art; if so, why are such hoaxes so easy to
perpetrate? (Australia has a history of similar ruses.)

One reason I ask is because my father was a painter of the school that
puts art before artist. That is, the image of the artist should never
color the appreciation of a work.

-GCH

[Randy R. Cox]

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Sorry, I don't know much about Australian art. I have some whacky
theories about plains indian images... characters have the same faces
because artist tend to think of themselves as part of the whole rather
than the center, but I'd rather not box them in. If there were iron
clad rules, it wouldn't be art!!!

About artist copying styles. . .well I can type a book that looks
exactly like "Tom Sawyer" but that doesn't make me Mark Twain. Art is
funny in that I can never define or exactly understand it. I can only
sense things about it. I can feel more than I can understand or
explain!!!

I have searched all my life for a universal definition for art and
haven't found one yet. I'm still looking.

Randy