The Labyrinth in First Nations Cultures
What if the labyrinth was never just a Greek myth?
Long before the Minotaur prowled the Cretan labyrinth of Greek legend, First Nations Australians were living and breathing a labyrinth of their own. It was in the vast red desert, the winding waterhole, the sacred songlines stretching across thousands of kilometres of ancient country.
In this richly layered work, Corinne Mesana traces the labyrinth as a living archetype through Australian First Nations art, spirituality, story, and culture. From the mesmerising dot paintings of Emily Kame Kngwarreye to the Rainbow Serpent weaving through Arnhem Land, from Dreaming journeys encoded in ceremony to the Bangarra Dance Company's powerful choreographies, the labyrinth emerges not as a puzzle to be solved but as a sacred path to be walked.
This book also confronts harder truths. The labyrinth sheltered First Nations people from colonial violence. It was the bush they vanished into, the country that protected them. But it also became the city that swallowed them whole.
Guided by Elders, artists, poets, dancers, and filmmakers, readers are invited to see First Nations culture not as a relic of the past but as an intricate, living knowledge system, as complex and beautiful as any labyrinth.
A profound journey through one of the world's oldest living cultures, told through art, land, and story.
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