Who was Albert Namatjira?
Albert Namatjira was an Arrernte artist from Central Australia, famous for his watercolour landscapes of the MacDonnell Ranges. He was one of the first Aboriginal artists to become widely known across Australia.
Born in 1902 at Hermannsburg Mission west of Alice Springs, Namatjira learned watercolour painting in the 1930s from artist Rex Battarbee. His first solo exhibition in Melbourne in 1938 sold out.
His paintings show ghost gums, red cliffs, gorges and purple ranges in bright light, in a European-style watercolour technique. They became extremely popular, and prints hung in homes across Australia.
Citizenship and tragedy
In 1957, Namatjira and his wife became the first Aboriginal people in the Northern Territory granted full citizenship. In 1958 he was convicted of supplying alcohol to a relative, served a short sentence in 1959 and died later that year.
For decades the copyright to his works was held by a trustee and then sold. In 2017, after a long campaign, the copyright was returned to the Namatjira family.
His descendants and other Western Arrernte artists continue the Hermannsburg School of painting, and the Hermannsburg Potters are also well known. A portrait of Namatjira by William Dargie won the Archibald Prize in 1956.
Did You Know?
Namatjira met Queen Elizabeth II in Canberra in 1954.