At the start of every school parade at Mr R and Miss L's school, they have an
Acknowledgement of Country. It is used before meetings and other gatherings to recognise the Indigenous people as custodians of our land. When members of the Indigenous community are able to start the event, they will "Welcome (the attendees) to Country".
I want to share with you my small tribute to these people who have lived on this land for thousands of years and hold it close in their hearts and spirits.
This manicure did not turn out how I wanted it to. I wanted to use Australian nail polishes in black, red and yellow but none of the red and black Australian (made or owned) polishes would co-operate even with the addition of thinner. A re-think was required. Here is what I decided to continue fitting in with the colours of the
Australian Aboriginal Flag.
Black: Colour Club Revvvolution. Black symbolises the Indigenous people of Australia. For me, the sparkles of the holographic will bring the Dreamtime with the Rainbow Serpent into my manicure.
Red: Rimmel Hot Rock. This polish is perfectly named to represent the red earth. It is a red jelly with gold glass flecks.
Yellow: BYS The Right Bright and Ulta3 Honolulu. These two yellows are to embody the sun. The Right Bright is a jellyish polish touted as a "Neon" on the bottle and Honolulu is a standard yellow creme.
Now onto the details of the manicure. Let us start with my thumb. The Australian Aboriginal Flag is represented on my thumb. In Australia this design is copyrighted by
Harold Thomas who designed the flag in 1971.
Over a base coat I applied two coats of Hot Rock and then a coat to Seche Vite. When it was dry I taped off half of my thumb to apply a generous coat of Revvvolution. After ripping off the tape I applied yet another coat of Seche Vite. I applied Honolulu with a dotting tool and tried to make it large enough to look right. Honolulu was used as it was the more opaque of the yellow polishes.
My sun is not very round and I should have applied another coat of Hot Rock. Still, I think you can recognise what the design is supposed to be if you are familiar with the flag.
Now for my regular fingers. All of them except my ring finger have a base colour of Color Club Worth the Risque. This was so that the holographic could add sparkle and interest through the watermarbling. I had originally intended to watermarble all of my fingers and have the flag on my thumb. Something was not right and the polish would not co-operate. I am still a watermarbling novice. The polish would not spread and so I changed the Australian red and black I was using because they were too thick. I had to use BYS The Right Bright for my watermarbling and even then I added some thinner to it. For some reason the polishes had trouble spreading. Sometimes they would and at others they would not.
On my index finger I did some kind of toothpick drag. Over the base colour I added a stripe of Revvvolution, The Right Bright and Hot Rock and then scraped across my nail with a toothpick left over from my watermarbling attempts.
My middle and little fingers were treated to watermarbling. It was frustrating and very messy but the outcomes are nice even if not as bold as I was hoping for. My favourite part of the design is on the middle finger where there is a concentrated band of yellow, red and black.
Last of all, my favourite design of all of my fingers. The design is easy and you probably do not need me to describe what I have done. Over a base colour of Revvvolution I have dotted Worth the Risque, Hot Rock and Honolulu. I used a dotting tool to create this design meant to evoke dot painting, one of the most famous styles of contemporary Aboriginal Art.
It may not have finished as I had planned but I do think it is an attractive manicure as a tribute.
