You will need to do a bit of research about the style of art, what tribe it is from, and if it has been described anywhere else. The biggest thing to remember is to get the facts correct in what the image represents by reading the context, and also describing in plain language. If the image is thick lines and shapes, then describe it that way. As with art, you can compare more abstract parts of an image to a commonly know object.

This first example is taken from Nishga by Abel, J. The describer did a bit of research to learn what the image represented.

[Alt text] A Nisga’a illustration of a human and wolf blended together. The image is mirrored down the middle, with each half a copy of the other. The person faces forward with an elongated oval head and square torso with its limbs drawn as thick lines. It holds its hands up to its shoulders with its large palms pointing outwards. There is an eye in each palm. It bends its knees pointing outwards with small black feet drawn with curved lines. Two other shapes frame the person on either side: a profile of a wolf face beside the persons’ arm, and a hand-like shape sitting on their bent knee. See the link below the image for an extended description.

[Long Description]

A Nisga’a illustration of a person blended together with a wolf, created by Lawrence Wilson. The drawing is mirrored down the middle, with each half a copy of the other. Down each side are three shapes framing the person in the center.

The person faces forward with their arms raised up to their shoulders and their knees bent pointing outwards.

They have an elongated oval head with small human ears on each side. The head is drawn as a thick outline with the eyes and cheeks shaded in a lighter colour. The face has two white almond shaped eyes with large black round pupils and one long eyebrow. Its nose is triangular and has three small white ovals: two look like nostrils. Its mouth is a wide, horizontal long oval the length of most of the face.

They have a square torso that is drawn with a thick outline and a lighter shaded in center with smaller shapes. On the chest there are two small ovals side by side with smaller darker ovals in the center. Just below this is a rounded triangle that gives the sense of a face with a long snout or a chest with abdomen muscles.

Its arms bend at the elbow, raising its palms facing forward on either side of its head. Its thumbs are long and thin and curl into its ears. The hands are outlined in black with black fingers and grey palms. There are white half-moon shapes at the base of each finger, and there is an almond shaped eye with a large black pupil on the center of each palm.

Just below the hands are two floating heads that face away from the person at each side.. The head is in full profile and is an oval shape with a thick line along the top that extends out from the tip. It has a large almond shaped eye above a small triangular nose connected to a long open mouth that appears like a wolf jaw.

Its legs bend at the knee pointing outwards and its feet meet at the center. Like its arms, the legs are drawn as thick curling lines with feet that are drawn with two dark pointy lines that appear to be like two waved claws. Two more hands sit on its knees with their palms facing outwards. The thumbs curl up to meet its elbows. They are the same as the other hands, except that the eyes are replaced with a wide white oval filled with another black oval.