“LIKAN’MIRI LL” is an important exhibition opening at the ANU Drill Hall Gallery today, jointly presented by the ANU National Centre for Indigenous Studies, the Drill Hall Gallery and the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies. 

Curated by Indigenous art expert, Wally Caruana, it features many pieces, selected from the collection at AIATSIS that have never before been on public display.

The exhibition includes 19th century sketches, children’s drawings, bark paintings, sculptures and glassware, and continues from the first exhibition called “Likan’mirri,” held in 2004, by exploring connections between the past and the present, with exhibits that date back several decades alongside others that are vividly contemporary.

The objects selected for exhibition objects originally come from remote areas like the Central and Far Western Deserts, Arnhem Land, the Kimberley, the Tiwi Islands, as wells as metropolitan and rural Australia.

There will be pieces by well-known artists and also anonymous makers, intrinsically beautiful but also offering insights on the connections between people, places, objects and ideas during the course of recent Indigenous and Australian history.

AIATSIS Principal, Russell Taylor, will open the exhibition at 6pm tonight and Caruana will give a floortalk for the public at noon tomorrow, Friday, November 9.

“Likan’mirri ll: Indigenous art from the AIATSIS Collection,” at the ANU  Drill Hall Gallery, Kingsley Street (off Barry Drive), Wednesday to Sunday, noon-5pm until December 16.