Aboriginal Dot Painting Australia for Kids

To make paint the traditional way you will need some ochre rocks . Ochres are found naturally in the ground all around the worls. They are non-toxic, and can be used to make an oil paint that dries quickly and covers surfaces thoroughly. To manufacture ground ochre, ochre clay is first mined from the ground. It is then washed in order to separate sand from ochre, which can be done by hand. The remaining ochre is then dried in the sun and sometimes burned to enhance the natural colour.

I have had great fun doing dot paintings on CS3 photoshop, but you can use Corel draw or paint programs to do the same.

Doing a dot painting on the computer means you can easily choose any colour background for your painting and you can experiment with your creativity. The design you come up with on your computer can be your blue print for a painting project later on. I have also found that Photoshop is an excellent program to produce line drawings of my photographs and these line drawings can then be used as templates for other projects. Your imagination is the only limitation when using these great programs.

CS3 Photoshop is probably outdated by now so lookout for the latest Photoshop upgrade. The picture here is my first attempt at a digital dot painting. i hope you like it.

There are many different Aboriginal tribes in Australia and each tribe or people group have their own unique symbols and stories. Whilst there are many differences there are also many similarities and you will find some of the same symbols used nearly Australia wide. This can especially be so for such things as animal tracks, rain symbols and meeting place symbols.

When doing your own dot paintings you can copy some of their symbols as well as make up your own to tell your own story. There are some symbols used by Aboriginals that are sacred to their own people groups and these are usually not presented in public art.

Symbols can be used to represent hunting, sacred ceremonies, tribal boundaries and the placement of waterholes. All of these things were important to the culture of Australian Aboriginals.

One thing I love about Australian Dot Painting is that you don't need a lot of expensive tools to make your art. Originally the Australian artists used their fingers and sticks to do their paintings and they even used their saliva to mix the ochre pigments into paint.

Not only were their tools easy to find but also their canvas. Aboriginals used to do their paintings on bark, smooth rocks, everyday utensils such as their Woomera (throwing stick) and on the walls of caves. We can choose anything to paint on from paper to bark. Just remember though that some modern day surfaces such as tiles and glass will require specialised paints as the traditional paints and kids poster paints will often not stay on such surfaces.

Some things I have used to do dot paintings are nail heads, bamboo skewers, cotton buds, dowel sticks, and the more modern day paint brushes. I recommend that you experiment with a variety of things to use.

Whilst we often focus on the dots in dot paintings there are also other elements within the pictures that certainly have their place. Outlines of animals and people are regularly used as well as some geometric shapes, lines and squiggles. When you begin to look at Australian Aboriginal Art in the dot painting genre you will discover a whole lot of design elements used by these artists. They certainly have a sense of aesthetics that is unique to their culture.

Australian Animals section on the www.outbackjack.info website, there you will find some colour in pictures that you can use in your classroom for when you do your dot paintings. They do have a limited use and I would appreciate acknowledgement of source when you use them.

This art work is at Whyalla - South Australia found at the Cafe at the town beach. Whilst there is no real dot painting in this artwork we see here some of the images and symbols that Australian Aboriginals use in their more traditional paintings. This is a good example of traditional and more contemporary styles making a very pleasing art work