Remembering the Future: Warlpiri Life Through the Prism of Drawing

In a lucid style, Remembering the Future tracks the return of the indigenous Australian Warlpiri peoples to communities and their important collection of drawings, six decades after they were made. Discussions with many people, journeys to places, and archival research build a compelling account of the colonial and contemporary circumstances of Warlpiri lives. Crayon drawings collected by anthropologists provide an illuminating prism through which to explore how the Warlpiri people of central Australia have seen their place in the world and have been seen by others. Driven by speculative enquiry, this study is as much concerned with beguiling questions that remain unanswered and the limits of scholarship, as it is with what truths drawings might speak. Through these pictorial encounters substantial and fresh insights are generated into the crucial place of images in relationships between Warlpiri people and others. The result is a book that makes a significant contribution to the anthropology and history of central Australia, as well as the wider emergent field of visual studies.