Greenbush Art Group: Shake, Rattle and Roll

A History of Central Australian Transport

Presented by Araluen Arts Centre

Shake, Rattle and Roll: A History of Central Australian Transport by the Greenbush Art Group at the Alice Springs Correctional Centre, pays tribute to and interprets the history of transport in Central Australia. Early transport created a paradigm shift in desert regions, enabling the expansion of settler colonialism, ‘opening up’ the continent’s interior, creating cultural complexity and irrevocably changing the way people live, travel and engage with this country.

Using salvaged materials such as scrap metal and copper wire, in the strong Central Australian tradition of Bush Toy making, these delicately detailed and evocative works chart that rapid technological change from foot, to horse, to camel and Afghan cameleer history, to the shrinking of time and space through steam power and internal combustion engine.

With restricted access to materials and the artists’ creativity within those limits, the exhibition also reflects the legendary ingenuity that was necessary for remote desert transport over epic distances and in often brutal conditions.