Cultural relationships with design

After reading about the Celts and their history, how has their culture filtered through to modern society both in Australia ad the world in general?

The Celts were around long before Rome conquered the known world. They had their own language, customs, art and culture across a vast area. They did not just live in Britain and Ireland, the came from Spain and France to southern Germany and the Alpine lands, Bohemia, and later in Italy, the Balkans and even central Turkey.

The Celts created a variety of arts such as Celtic tattooing and Celtic clip art. Their culture also had their own language, name, letters and Celtic designs. The most famous Celtic designs are the Celtic Knot, Celtic cross Celtic spiral and Celtic animal print.

These can all be seen in modern society today through the use of typography, jewellery, ordainments, tattoos, fashion and stationary such as borders, backgrounds etc.

Aboriginal art is defiantly visual. It is also much more to it’s artists and people. Can you comment on what a cultures art might mean to its people and how it can socially affect itself and other cultural groups.

Aboriginal art symbolises the world and the beliefs of the aboriginal people. Traditional aboriginal art represents the dreaming but is often also a vital part of ceremonies.

Aboriginals have been around for over 40 000 years and traditionally used materials from nature. This varied the type of art found across Australia depending on the area it came from. In the central desert, ground drawing was a very important style of art and throughout Australia rock art as well as body painting and decoration were common although varying in styles, method, materials and meaning.

Aboriginal groups exchanged natural resources, such as ochre’s, and tools, such as stone axes and boomerangs, thus creating extensive trading networks. Items were traded hundreds of kilometers from their original source. Large gatherings of people came together where they would exchange specialty items among each other.

Aboriginal art affects its own people to maintain traditional representations and styles. The art created by ancestors are passed down and different symbols represented in the artwork mean different things. Concentric circles usually represent campsites, waterholes or places of significance. Curved lines generally represent rain or water traveling underground. Straight lines may be indicative of traveling & when these lines join concentric circles it may show the pathway traveled by the ancestors. A small "U" shaped figure may represent a person & depending on the iconography next to the person determines whether it is male or female. 


I believe Aboriginal art can affect anyone who takes interest into it and explores its meaning. It’s fascinating to know each symbol, colour and pattern has meaning to the aboriginal people. Not only that but aboriginal people believe that you must respect the earth and nature own us not the other way around. A lot of people have taken this on board and become more environmentally friendly and found what destruction ‘mother nature’ can do.

M.C. Escher's work is highly detailed. Most designers and lay people are highly impressed by his work and dedication to his art. Why?

Escher spent so much time and enthusiasm on his work and added so much detail to each piece. During his lifetime, made 448 lithographs, woodcuts and wood engravings and over 2000 drawings and sketches. His most famous pieces where Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, Dürer and Holbein. I believe most people are fascinated with how Escher creates perfect patter within his artwork combining different shapes and details to form a perfect piece.

What is so interesting about art and culture of the past?

When looking at the past and the history of art I find it amazing how each nationality has found so many ways to produce its work. Usually when you look back on early artist they found natural resources to create beautiful pieces of artwork.

In many cultures art was a form of communication and it was a way of passing information through generations. Also within different cultures there could be several different languages depending on which area a certain group came from so they may not be able to speak read or write the same. 

Inspiration can also be given by looking a pieces from the past as most things at some stage have already been done before.

Why look backwards to our history when trying to engage in design solutions for modern society? examples.. 

In modern society it is sometimes hard to find things that are different in design trends. From looking backwards in history you may gather inspiration from other cultures, eras and patterns.

Certain shapes textures and colours may spark an idea in a persons head to create something similar with a modern touch.

How has ancient art effected your life? examples..

When looking at the history and culture of any art form it has an effect on me. I love each different race and how they made their unique art works. The material they use and the meaning of the work to them and their people.

When gathering inspiration it is always amazing to look at ancient art and see how other people use colours pattern shapes etc and bring it into your own work as well.

What cultural influences has occured in your life. examples.

I think there are probably a lot of cultural influences in my life, I cannot think of any major ones but some I can think of is the food we eat on an everyday basis you have many diverse ranges of food you can buy in the supermarket which comes from around the world such as Chinese, Italian, Thai and much more. Also artwork that is placed within the home has been influenced on cultures and their design. Defiantly as a multicultural society we are open so many different cultures without even realising it such as music, food, drinks, medicines, artwork