Well, I was very excited about the National Gallery which the Australia Rough Guide described, wrongly it turns out, as having a large and rather magnificent collection of Aboriginal artwork. The collection is limited to one small room crammed next to the conceptual art display of metal shelving and crystal mirrors. It is quite an interesting exhibit: a hundred or so burial poles from different peoples representing all the Aboriginal people who died under Australian rule and who weren't properly buried. Bones are placed in these hollowed-out logs. The burial poles show animals and fish that are particularly important to that tribe of people. And the dots represent important physical or spiritual places. When I looked in the gallery bookshop I thought I missed an entire Aboriginal section but the bookstore clerk informed me that all the pieces I wanted to see were in storage.
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