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This comprehensive survey uniquely covers both Aboriginal art and that of European Australians, providing a revealing examination of the interaction between the two. Painting, bark art, photography, rock art, sculpture, and the decorative arts are all fully explored to present the rich texture of Australian art traditions. Well-known artists such as Margaret Preston, Rover Thomas, and Sidney Nolan are all discussed, as are the natural history illustrators, Aboriginal draughtsmen, and pastellists, whose work is only now being brought to light by new research. Taking the European colonization of the continent in 1788 as his starting point, Sayers highlights important issues concerning colonial art and women artists in this fascinating new story of Australian art.
Andrew Sayers examines a considerable body of drawings produced by Aboriginal artists between 1803 and 1903. Never before collected as a genre, these works are retained in museums, libraries, or private hands and have rarely been displayed. Often regarded as inauthentic art because of their stylistic borrowings and fluctuations, they enjoy a unique status as products of the interaction between Aboriginal society and the British colonizers. The largest group of drawings comes from the hands of three artists--Tommy McCrae (c1823-1901), William Barak (c1824-1903), and Ulladulla Mickey (c1820-1891), who produced their drawings in the 1880s and 1890s. Visually these drawings are varied, but they possess many of the aesthetic qualities which characterize contemporary Aboriginal art, displaying intense vitality and an acute understanding of flora and fauna.--publisher.