Albert Namatjira
Albert Namatjira was an influential Aboriginal Australian painter born Elea on July 28, 1902, in Hermannsburg, Northern Territory. He is best known for his watercolor landscapes that depicted Dreamtime sites significant to the Arrernte people, rendered in a Western artistic style. His journey as an artist began after being inspired by a Hermannsburg exhibition in 1934 and was further nurtured by painter Rex Battarbee, who guided him in landscape painting. Namatjira quickly gained recognition, holding his first solo exhibition in 1938, which sold out, and he became increasingly celebrated through the 1940s.
Despite his success, Namatjira faced systemic racial discrimination, including restrictions on his citizenship and personal freedoms. He was eventually granted full citizenship and the rights that came with it in 1957. His life and work highlight the complex interplay between Indigenous culture and Western art traditions, marking him as a significant figure in modern Aboriginal art. Namatjira’s legacy continues to inspire, with his paintings highly sought after and celebrated in galleries across Australia, reflecting both cultural heritage and the struggles of Indigenous Australians. He passed away on August 8, 1959, but remains a pivotal figure in Australian art history.
Albert Namatjira
Aboriginal Australian artist
- Born: July 28, 1902
- Place of Birth: Hermannsburg, Northern Territory
- Died: August 8, 1959
- Place of Death: Alice Springs, Northern Territory
Significance: Albert Namatjira was a prolific painter whose watercolor landscapes depicted dreamtime Arrernte sites in a Western style. His work became extremely significant at the turn of the twenty-first century and is widely represented in all Australian state galleries.
Background
Albert Namatjira was born Elea on 28 July 1902 in Hermannsburg, Northern Territory, a community of Arrernte Aboriginal peoples. His family moved into the Finke River Mission in 1905, adopting Lutheran Christianity, and Elea was christened Albert on December 25. He began attending the Hermannsburg mission school in 1909, after which he lived apart from his parents, often sketching everyday scenes around him. He spent six months in 1915 undertaking the Arrernte initiation ritual, in which he learned traditional practices from his tribal elders.
Namatjira was confirmed in the church on April 7, 1918, taking his first Holy Communion. In 1920, however, he left the mission to elope with a non-Christian woman of the Kukatja people, of which both the Lutherans at the mission and other Arrernte tribe members disapproved. The couple returned to Hermannsburg in 1923 with three young children. After his return, Namatjira was encouraged by the superintendent of the mission to use his artistic skills to create traditional artifacts and mulga-wood plaques to sell to tourists, while also working variously as a blacksmith, carpenter, stockperson, and cameleer to earn a living.
He first saw painted landscapes of his homeland in 1934 at a Hermannsburg exhibition by Rex Battarbee and John Gardner, which inspired him to become a professional painter. He guided Battarbee as a cameleer in 1936 around the MacDonnell Ranges on a two-month landscape-painting expedition, receiving tuition and displaying a pronounced natural talent. He began painting watercolor landscapes on traditional Aboriginal artifacts.
In March 1937, the Hermannsburg superintendent displayed ten of his paintings at a craft sale at the annual Nuriootpa Lutheran Synod. Battarbee subsequently included three of his works at a Royal South Australian Society of Arts exhibition in Adelaide. In 1938, Battarbee organized Namatjira’s first solo exhibition at the Fine Art Society Gallery in Melbourne, which sold out.
Artistic Career
Namatjira’s paintings, including signature early works Wildlife near the Gosse Range and Twa-tarra, sold rapidly, and his popularity grew, attracting in particular the attention of Princess Elizabeth. Battarbee aided him in all aspects of his work, helping a school of artists grow around him in Hermannsburg.
Namatjira became famous for his Western-style watercolor treatments of Dreamtime Arrernte landscapes, sites of spiritual significance in traditional Arrernte beliefs. His April 1944 exhibition at Melbourne’s Myer Mural Hall also sold out. The publication of the book The Art of Albert Namatjira the same year made his works familiar to thousands, selling twenty thousand copies over the next fifteen years.
Namatjira made about £1,000 at his first exhibition in Sydney in March 1945, including several international sales. His famous works from the 1940s include Western MacDonnells, Palm Valley, Ghost Gum, Glen Helen, and Kwariitnama (Organ Pipes). He became a tourist attraction, notably sought out by the Duke and Duchess of Gloucester in March 1946. A 1947 documentary about him entitled Namatjira the Painter was the first Australian post-war documentary released in theaters.
Despite his growing fame, Namatjira faced discrimination from White Australian society. Although, as an Aboriginal Australian, he was not considered a citizen of Australia, Namatjira was ordered to pay £417 in taxes in 1947. His attempts to secure a grazing license in 1949–50 and to build a house on his land at Alice Springs in 1951 failed due to racially discriminatory laws.
Namatjira was a western Arrernte elder by the early 1950s and a custodian of traditional stories. In 1952, Namatjira was able to charge over £100 each for his works. He received a Queen Elizabeth II coronation medal in 1953 and was presented to the queen in Canberra in 1954 on her command, his first opportunity to travel outside the Northern Territory.
However, despite becoming a national figure, he lived in a border camp at Morris Soak outside Alice Springs and was arrested in December 1954 for taking a sip from a proffered bottle of wine. He spent the night in jail and appeared in court at Alice Springs on December 24.
He was appointed an honorary member of the Royal Art Society of New South Wales in 1955, but around this time, his relationship with Battarbee and the Aranda Arts Council soured when they attempted to assert control over Namatjira’s work output and quality. He was invited to Sydney in 1956 by writer Frank Clune, who held a dinner in his honor attended by Dame Mary Gilmore.
Public pressure led to Namatjira and his wife being granted full Australian citizenship in 1957, allowing him legally to build a house and purchase alcohol, which he shared with other members of his community. In 1958, Namatjira was charged with supplying alcohol to the artist Henoch Raberaba and sentenced to six months hard labor. Broad public outcry helped implement two court appeals, which succeeded in reducing his sentence to three months. He eventually served two months before dying of heart failure on 8 August 1959.
Impact
Namatjira is considered one of Australia’s great artists. By the early twenty-first century, his watercolor landscapes were worth tens of thousands of dollars and represented in all Australian state galleries.
Namatjira was the first Aboriginal artist to employ the Western artistic tradition, and his works stand as important landmarks of cultural assimilation. His career was highly influential on modern Aboriginal art, and he is considered the forefather of the Hermannsburg School watercolor artists. His life tragically demonstrated the racial inequity of Australian politics, playing a small role in increased recognition of the injustices faced by Aboriginal people in Australia.
His artwork, which comprises around two thousand pieces, has received international praise. His works gained renewed notoriety in 2022, and demand for his art surged. His Glen Helen Gorge and The Grandeur–Mount Sonda paintings sold at auction for $120,000 and $54,000, respectively. His work and life story began to be appreciated more than ever in the twenty-first century as the first Indigenous person to acquire citizenship and a leader in Indigenous rights.
Personal Life
Namatjira and his wife, Rubina, had five sons and three daughters. Many of his children and descendants became landscape painters. His personal totem was the carpet snake. He spent most of his later life living in tents and shanty houses at Morris Soak. His grandchildren became renowned artists in the twenty-first century, winning notable awards and capturing the beautiful scenes of the Australian Outback.
Bibliography
“Albert Namatjira (1902–1959).” Ngurratjuta Iltja Ntjarra: Many Hands Art Centre, manyhandsart.com.au/about/albert-namatjira/. Accessed 11 June 2024.
“Albert Namatjira—Fact Sheet 145.” National Archives of Australia, 2020, www.naa.gov.au/sites/default/files/2020-05/fs-145-albert-namatjira.pdf. Accessed 11 June 2024.
Edmond, Martin. "Double Lives: Rex Battarbee & Albert Namatjira." Western Sydney University, 2013, researchdirect.westernsydney.edu.au/islandora/object/uws:18566. Accessed 11 June 2024.
Kleinert, Sylvia. “Namatjira, Albert (Elea) (1902–1959).” Australian Dictionary of Biography, vol. 15, 2006, adb.anu.edu.au/biography/namatjira-albert-elea-11217. Accessed 11 June 2024.
“Seeing the Centre: The Art of Albert Namatjira 1902-1959.” National Gallery of Australia, www.ngv.vic.gov.au/exhibition/seeing-the-centre/. Accessed 11 June 2024.