Rock Art Research
PICTURING NAYOMBOLMI: THE MOST PROLIFIC KNOWN ROCK ART ARTIST IN THE WORLD
(1)
The University of Western Australia, School of Social Sciences, Australia
(2)
School of Humanities, University of Adelaide, Australia
(3)
Gold Coast campus, Griffith University, Australia
Abstract
This article presents a broad overview of the life and artworks of Badmardi Aboriginal artist Nayombolmi (c. 1895–1967) from today’s Kakadu National Park, the Northern Territory in Australia. The article pictures his life through oral history, photographs and some of his many artworks in the form of rock paintings, beeswax figures and bark paintings. It touches on how Nayombolmi and his father used rock art as an educational medium in the intergenerational transmission of traditional lore and law. Nayombolmi made close to 800 rock art figures, justly earning him the epithet ‘the most prolific known rock art artist in the world’.