Felicity Wright knows the market of art buyers who wander through Injalak Arts in West Arnhem Land.

Customers were often cautious, she said, because they knew so little about ethically buying Indigenous art.

"They hear scary stories about the provenance of Aboriginal art; 'maybe it's come from Indonesia or it's been faked', 'maybe the artist has been ripped off'."

Ms Wright, Injalak's mentor manager since 2013, said customers also complained of little opportunity to learn about and engage with the artist and provenance in Darwin.

Others, she said, demonstrated a lack of knowledge about the various styles of Indigenous art in the Northern Territory.

"I've heard it over the years; they don't understand Aboriginal art, or they'll come to Injalak, where we're famous for our X-ray and figurative work, and they'll say: 'Where are the dot paintings?'"

The new centre stocks paintings, fabrics and sculptures from an array of remote art centres. ( Supplied: Merinda Campbell/Provenance Arts )

These experiences prompted Injalak Arts, which is owned and governed by a nine-person Aboriginal management committee, to look into opening an arts centre that also offered customers a cultural experience.

Situated on a busy Darwin highway, Provenance Arts has opened its doors to artwork from a dozen remote centres as far west as Balgo and as far south as Alice Springs.

'It's not cheap'

The spacious multi-purpose centre has been renovated to provide retail items, rotating exhibitions, tourism referrals and space for artists who've travelled from remote areas to relax with wi-fi.

But for all its ambition to improve the art market, which can be dominated by fake art and consumers unknowingly buying them, opening the space has not been cheap.

As a social enterprise, Injalak Arts is the recipient of various grants, but by Ms Wright's estimation, subsidies cover only about 15 per cent of its operational costs.

Ms Wright says buying ethically doesn't have to be difficult or necessarily expensive. ( ABC Radio Darwin: Jesse Thompson )

"There's a lot of expenses and you're paying for a lot of things you wouldn't necessarily expect to be paying for," she said.

"Injalak Arts pays out $25,000 a year for funeral expenses, so every time someone passes away, we donate at least $500 in purchase orders to support funeral expenses, and also our car is used as a hearse and people come and get free cloth for the burial service."

In this economic climate, Injalak's entrepreneurial team took the gamble of opening the large subsidiary centre.

Funding came from several NT Government grants, but costs quickly blew out as they realised the ambition of the space.

"We had a budget that we thought would cover refurbishment and it was out by at least $200,000," Ms Wright said.

"If you want to do things well and you want to do things ethically, it's not cheap."

Ms Wright said she was grateful the landlords had not been pestering her for rent.

"The reality is we've got a shortfall and that's pretty stressful.

"We had to make the decision: Do we push on?"

Calls to change the law

Is the playing field between ethical and unethical vendors level?

On the one hand, many outright fakes are cheaply mass produced.

But according to the Association of Northern, Kimberley and Arnhem Aboriginal Artists (ANKAAA), which supports more than 5,000 artists from 48 Aboriginal-owned art centres, the ethical issues are more fundamental.

"I think most of these arguments are a bit superfluous to the basic fact that the people who are producing fake art are impersonating the identities of Indigenous people and Indigenous products," ANKAAA chief executive Christina Davidson said.

"So I guess the question of the level playing field is that one lot of people are acting deceptively, and the other lot of people are honestly sharing their culture with great generosity."

Provenance Arts opened its doors earlier this week. ( Supplied: Merinda Campbell/Provenance Arts )

In its submission to a parliamentary inquiry into the prevalence of fake Aboriginal art, ANKAAA was one of several organisations to suggest current laws were inadequate.

"The gist of it is that it would be no longer possible to legally sell these objects in Australia, because at the moment it's not actually illegal to do it," Ms Davidson said.

"It's immoral but not illegal."

In the meantime, Ms Wright hopes Provenance will front the issue by showing its customers that buying ethically is neither difficult nor necessarily expensive.

"If you're not providing alternatives in those price points and let people know that this is a fair deal — the licensing agreement is fair, or this was actually made by an Aboriginal person — then what options do they have?

"They're going to exit through the gift shop in the airport and buy crap."