00:00At an art centre in a north Queensland rainforest, artists are reinventing skills of their ancestors.
00:11Many are elders, coming to the craft later in life.
00:16When I had the bypass then, ah, I'd better slow up, you know what I mean?
00:20One of the centre's specialties, the bargoo, is an undeniably adorable take on a traditional
00:26fire-starting tool.
00:28The children come up and say, oh look at these little dolls, and you go, you kind of have
00:32a little laugh and you go, no.
00:34Originally wood, it's now ceramic, and painted with striking colours and patterns.
00:40The boggle is traditionally made in the form of a man, so they've kind of still maintained
00:44that same structure of the traditional tool.
00:48One of those reviving lost art is Abe Moriarty.
00:51He says weaving skills had declined in his community.
00:55And I was really disappointed.
00:57The traditional basket that came from here is such an exquisite artefact.
01:07He studied surviving baskets, visually deconstructing them to build technique.
01:12This is what we've got to get back to.
01:14It's been my thing, what drives me to sort of go back and get the best.
01:21It's taken him to some special places, and inspired others with the global art scene
01:26in their sights.
01:28Get up there and out there and tell the world we are also indigenous artists, but we are
01:33from the rainforest.
01:35All the while, keeping stories alive.
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