Using new dating techniques, scientists have now determined that rock art found in the Kimberley region was created before the height of the last ice age 'glaciation' 16 000 years ago.
This discovery is part of an Australian Research Council project which brought together researchers from three Australian Universities (Macquarie, Wollongong and New England) together with traditional owners from Kandiwal and Kalumburu.
Research teams recorded more than 200 sites over a three-year period, providing a broad platform establishing the antiquity of the art.
Although the production of Kimberley rock art spans many thousands of years, it remains central to the cultural beliefs of the Indigenous population of the region today. Ethnographic accounts confirm that painting and retouching of rock art was still practised well into the twentieth century.
Dr Kira Westaway, a geochronologist from Macquarie University, says that one of the 3 and most successful technique used to determine the age of the rock art in the Kimberley is OSL (optically-stimulated luminescence).
OSL is a light sensitive dating method applied to the sand grains found within mud wasp nests that adhere to art motifs and become fossilised over time, creating a type of time capsule.
OSL results confirm that the origin of the northwest Kimberley rock art assemblage is indeed ancient. It also proves that art was being painted just after the height of the last glaciation - 16,000 years ago.