SONGLINES: TRACKING THE SEVEN SISTERS. A fascinating exhibition in New Delhi

What an interesting, informative & beautifully presented exhibition this is.

The Kiran Nadar Museum of Art has collaborated with the National Museum of Australia to bring to Delhi a collection of nearly 300 paintings, objects and multimedia works from Australia’s First Nation. The exhibition narrates the saga of the Seven Sisters, a dramatic story of journey, desire, and survival across the Australian desert, showcasing how ancient knowledge, songs, and dances are deeply interwoven with the land itself.

According to the KNMA website, Songlines is one of the world’s oldest living cultures — a tradition sustained for over 65,000 years. I admit to knowing nothing about this culture and art form, so had everything to learn.

And learn I did.

In a first ever for me, there were absolutely charming young men and women guiding us personally through the exhibition. They are all associated with the Kiran Nadar Museum of Art, which is to be congratulated on such a super initiative.

The youngster were, without exception, polite, engaged, knowledgeable, articulate and made our visit so much fun. The exhibition has only just opened, so (luckily for us) was empty, and with the young people explaining so much to us and spending so much time with us, it felt like a personal tour.

You move physically around the museum complex, up and down floors, all of which adds to the feeling of accompanying the seven sisters on their journey across Australia’s arid interior.

The sisters – elders – welcome you (via video) to the different sections. Like so:

There are audio-visual effects as you move from room to room, leading you from one community to another. And there is always a sister to welcome you (below):

There was so much to absorb and learn, and I can’t pretend to have understood everything about such a complex belief system, but certain aspects resonated.

Beautiful (recent-ish) baskets, as the community does more craft work commercially. These are just gorgeous.

We were told the the government has set up art centres to let the community pass on their artistic and cultural knowledge to the younger generations:

There were lovely bead necklaces, made from seed pods and individually painted:

There are vessels/tools made from bark and then decorated – or, more recently, a vessel made from a battered, discarded car hub cap (extreme left, below):

Charmingly, in a figurative group of the seven sisters, one of them is using a similar vessel as a cradle (below):

The paintings look initially very simple, but have layers of meaning, which our knowledgable guides explained to us:

The end of the Seven Sisters epic (and excuse my brevity) has them fleeing the shapeshifting evil spirit who has pursued them throughout their history and wanderings, and they fly up to the sky and become the Pleiades constellation. fascinating.

This is a representation of them as they transformed gradually into stars:

The contemporary ceramics are gorgeous:

Just look at the detail of the insects on the lovely vase to the right.

The exhibition is in the Humayun’s Tomb Museum complex – a brilliant new space next to the absolutely fabulous sunken museum.

We paid our own way.

And no-one there knows that I blog and review.

Fascinating, and once again, hats off to the delightful young men and women who guided us through the different rooms, handing us on to their waiting colleagues.

Recommended. It has just opened (we couldn’t see one display as it was having teething problems) and is on until 1 March 2026.