Albert Namatjira

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Namatjira outside Government House, Sydney, circa 1947.
Namatjira outside Government House, Sydney, circa 1947.

Albert Namatjira (28 July 1902 – 8 August 1959), born Elea Namatjira , was a Western Arrernte man, an Indigenous Australian people of the Western MacDonnell Ranges area, and one of Australia's most acclaimed visual artists.

Though in his early career he painted a wide variety of subjects, he is best known for his watercolour Australian outback desert landscapes, a style which inspired the Hermannsburg School of Aboriginal art. While his work is obviously the product of his life and experiences, his paintings are not in the highly symbolic style of traditional Aboriginal art; they are richly detailed depictions. He is also notable for being the first Northern Territory Aborigine to be granted Australian citizenship in the sense of being freed from the restrictions of discriminatory legislation that made Aborigines wards of the State.

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[edit] Early years

Born near Alice Springs, he was raised on Hermannsburg Mission, Northern Territory and was baptised Albert after his parents' adoption of Christianity. After a western style upbringing on the mission, at the age of 12, Namatjira returned to the bush for initiation and was exposed to traditional culture as a member of the Arrernte community (which he was to eventually became an elder within). He obtained the love and respect of his land that is seen in his works. After he returned, he married his wife Rubina at the age of 18. His wife, like his father's wife, was from the wrong "skin" group and he violated the law of his people by marrying outside the classificatory kinship system. He was ostracised for several years in which he worked as a camel driver and saw much of central Australia, where he was to later paint.

Although doing a small amount of rough but non-traditional artwork in his youth, he was introduced to western style painting through an exhibition by two painters from Melbourne at his mission in 1934. One of these painters, Rex Battarbee, returned to the area in the winter of 1936 to paint the landscape and Albert acted as a guide to show him local scenic areas. In return Albert was shown how to paint with watercolours, a skill that he quickly excelled at. While he first started with crayons, he quickly progressed into watercolours and soon Battarbee began to realize Albert's true potential.

[edit] The height of success

Albert Namatjira started painting in a distinctly unique style. His landscapes normally highlighted both the rugged geological features of the land in the background, and the distinctive Australian flora in the foreground with very old stately and majestic white gum trees surrounded by twisted scrub. His work had a high quality of illumination showing the gashes of the land and the twists in the trees in a breathtaking manner. His colours were similar to the ochres that his ancestors had used to show the same landscape, but his style was appreciated by Europeans because it met the aesthetics of western art.

In 1938 his first exhibition was held in Melbourne and sold out. Subsequent exhibitions in Sydney and Adelaide also sold out. For ten years Namatjira continued to paint, his works continuing to sell quickly and his popularity continuing to rise. Queen Elizabeth II became one of his more notable fans and he was awarded the Queen's Coronation medal in 1953 and met her in Canberra in 1954. Not only did his own art become wildly recognized, but even a painting of him by William Dargie won the Archibald Prize in 1956. He became popular, critically acclaimed and wealthy. He, however, was always glad to return to the outback.

[edit] Works

Namatjira's works were colourful and varied depictions of the Australian landscape. One of his first landscapes from 1936, Central Australian Landscape, shows a land of rolling green hills. Another early work, Ajantzi Waterhole (1937), shows a close up view of a small waterhole, with Albert capturing the reflection in the water beautifully well. The landscape becomes one of contrasting colours, a device that is often used by Western painters, with red hills and green trees in Red Bluff (1938). Central Australian Gorge (1940) shows detailed rendering of rocks and reflections in the water. In Flowering Shrubs he contrasts the blossoming flowers in the foreground with the more barren desert and cliffs in the background. Namatjira's love of trees was often described so that his paintings of trees were more portraits than landscapes, which is shown in the portrait of the often depicted ghost gum tree in Ghost Gum Glen Helen (c.1945-49). His skills at colouring trees can be seen clearly in this portrait and Namatjira was fully aware of his own talent, as when describing another landscape painter Namatjira said to William Dargie.

"He does not know how to make the side of a tree which is in the light look the same colour as the side of the tree in shadow...I know how to do better."

His skills kept increasing with experience as is shown in the highly photographic quality of Mt Hermannsburg (1957), painted only two years before he died.

[edit] Citizenship and demise

Namatjira on his way to Alice Springs.
Namatjira on his way to Alice Springs.

Namatjira wanted to use his wealth to lease a cattle station. This, however, was not legally possible because he was Aboriginal. He then tried to build a house in Alice Springs, which he was also prevented from doing so because of his status. Despite the fact that he was held as one of Australia's greatest artists he could not own land. Due to his immense popularity this caused public outrage. The government granted Albert and his wife Australian citizenship in 1957, in the sense of exempting them from the restrictive legislation that applied only to Aborigines. This entitled them to vote, own land, build a house and buy alcohol.

Unfortunately, Albert was not legally allowed to supply his Aboriginal friends with alcohol, which was expected of him by the culture of his tribe who did not have the concept of personal property. After an Aboriginal woman Fay Iowa was killed at the Town camp of Morris Soak, Namatjira was held responsible by Jim Lemaire the Stipendiary Magistrate for bringing alcohol into the camp. He was reprimanded at the coronial inquest. It was against the law for an Australian citizen to supply alcohol to a native. Albert was charged with leaving a bottle of rum in a place i.e. on a car seat where a native, a clan brother and fellow Hermannsburg artist Henoch Raberaba, could get access to it. He was sentenced to six months in prison for supplying an Aboriginal with liquor. When he was released after two months he became despondent and did not paint again. He died, soon after in 1959 in Alice Springs, only two years after he was granted citizenship.

[edit] Since his death

At the time of his death Namatjira had painted a total of around two thousand paintings and had three biographical films made about him. His unique style of painting however was denounced soon after his death by many indigenous art puritans as being a product of his assimilation into western culture, rather than his own connection to his subject matter or his natural style.[citation needed] This view, although still present in some critics thoughts,[citation needed] has been largely abandoned and Albert Namatjira is hailed as one of the greatest Australian artists of all time and a pioneer for Aboriginal rights.

Namitjira's work is on public display in most of Australia's major art galleries.


Albert Namitjira is the subject of a song of the same name by the Australian band Not Drowning, Waving, included on their 1993 album, Circus. He is also referenced in Midnight Oil's song, Truganini.

[edit] See also

[edit] External links

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