ABSTRACT
Cairns Indigenous Arts Fair and online art galleries are putting Far North Queensland art up for the world to see and the world needs to be educated about art styles in the Far North, its peoples and practitioners. The culture concept, as it has been used inside the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander arts studio, focused on a form of high culture practices such as language, visual arts, music and dance. The artists inside the Technical and Further Education studio need to be understood in a framework based on the historical contexts of both the State of Queensland and the local developments in Cairns. The focus on high culture creates a hierarchy which prioritizes language, artefacts, legends and a flat style which rejects naturalism and realism. The main factor, however, in encouraging the focus on language, legends, music and dance was the fear of mainstreaming or losing the studio to non-Indigenous interests.
