Bark painting of Arnhem Land, Australia: the Western reception 1960–1990

Abstract

This article brings together existing research as well as new data to examine the shift in the reception of Arnhem Land (Australia) bark painting, from being understood initially as a form of ethnographic art, to one of contemporary art. It investigates the historical and conceptual nature of this process of recognition, especially its institutional basis. Despite key studies, this overall process is not well known or always considered. Although the reception of Aboriginal art has been increasingly researched, the focus has tended to be on Western Desert acrylic paintings. This article aims to more fully integrate the Arnhem Land bark painting into this history. My account follows the general patterns of reception, both within Australia and internationally. Interviews with key institutional protagonists provide new and critical reflections on one of the key moments in the globalisation of art in the late twentieth century.

Keywords:

• Arnhem land
• bark painting
• aboriginal art
• indigenous Australian art
• John Mawurndjul

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes on contributor

Marie Geissler is an Honorary Associate Fellow at the University of Wollongong, New South Wales, Australia with a specialisation in Indigenous Australian art. Her research interests include contemporary Australian art, postcolonial art history and transnational, cross-cultural artistic exchanges.

Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Notes

1 Coombs came to the Aboriginal cause in 1967 when he met Yolngu artist David Daymirringu Malangi. He went to pay Malangi compensation on behalf of the Commonwealth Government of Australia for having used Malangi’s painted bark image of the ancestral hunter Gurrumirringu. The Government printed on the Australian $1 note without prior permission from the artist. Malangi and Coombs became lifelong friends. Due to the prominence gained from this event and his relationship with Coombs, Malangi became a major player in the promotion of bark painting as contemporary art. A film on Malangi’s work was screened in Nick Waterlow’s ground-breaking European Dialogue Biennale, 1979. It was a centerpiece of Bernice Murphy’s Australian Perspecta 1983 and Objects and Representations from Ramingining 1983. Malangi also contributed to the Aboriginal Memorial, 1988.

2 Clifford Possum, Tim Leura and Michael Nelson Jagamara were early artists to adopt the large format to great aesthetic effect. The monumental Spirit Dreaming through Napperby Country (Possum Spirit Dreaming/ Napperby Death Spirit Dreaming), 1980 (297.7 × 670.8 cm) by Tim Leura Tjapaltjarri and Clifford Possum Tjapaltjarri was acquired for the NGV to commemorate the Bicentennial.

3 To provide wider cultural context, Margo Neale, Senior Indigenous curator at the National Museum of Australia, explained that she had created a ‘cultural hub’ – a special self-contained area within the exhibition where audiences could be given detailed knowledge about the artist, their land and culture (e.g., for Emily Kame Kngwarreye).

4 Martin first became interested in Aboriginal art in 1961 through collections in Paris (the Musée des arts d’Afrique et d’Océanie) and Basel. There were works collected in Australia by Czech curator, Karel Kupka. Martin was encouraged to exhibit it when in 1982 or 1983, he ‘met [Swiss artist and activist] Bernhard Lüthi in Zurich and he comforted me in my interest’.

5 Mollison first took notice of Aboriginal art in the Museum on Swanston Street in Melbourne at the age of 12. He was also drawn to the Spencer bark collection at the National Museum of Victoria. Fred McCarthy’s seminal publication Australian Aboriginal Decorative Art became a prized possession. Mollison recounted to me his early encounters with Aboriginal art, seeing it as ‘part of the great art traditions [he had] experienced all over the world’. He believed that the NGA should operate as a ‘Keeping Place’ for the Aboriginal art it held and established a way for works to be acquired within the contemporary budgets of the National Gallery of Australia.

6 At the time the Gallery was opened there were an estimated 219 bark paintings (most by Yirawala) in the collection, some 28 at the National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne and 126 at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney. For more detail see Geissler (2017, Appendices 1 and 1c).

7 In the 1980s, the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra acquired 618 barks and 114 acrylics. By contrast the numbers for the NGV was 77 and 184, respectively, and for the Art Gallery of New South Wales, 66 and 2, respectively.

8 Mundine had been appointed as curator-in-the-field at the AGNSW in 1983, the first time a state art gallery employed an Indigenous curator. He had been a long-time art adviser at Ramingining (David Malangi’s home country), and his intervention in the conceptual and curatorial organisation of Perspecta 1983 set a precedent in the history of Aboriginal art. The Indigenous artists themselves had critical input into the curation process.