Albert Namatjira

He was born at Hermannsburg Mission, Ntaria, in Alice Springs in 1902, the son of Jonathan Namatjira . They were Western Arrernte people. Namatjira was raised on the Hermannsburg Mission and baptised after his parents' adoption of Christianity. He was born as Elea, but once baptised, they changed his name to Albert. As a child, he sketched what he saw around him. After a western-style upbringing on the mission, including attending the school and living in a dormitory, separated from his parents, at the age of 13 Namatjira returned to the bush for initiation and was exposed to traditional culture and initiated as a member of the Arrernte community He also worked as a blacksmith, carpenter and stockman, at the mission and at the surrounding cattle stations. ==Career==

Namatjira was introduced to western-style painting through a charity art exhibition in 1933, which raised the money to bring fresh water to his hometown of Hermannsburg. The exhibition was run by Violet Teague, whom Namatjira admired enough to name his daughter after, and her sister Una. In 1934, Namatjira met Rex Battarbee and John Gardner, who had an exhibition at his mission. Battarbee returned to the area in the winter of 1936 to paint the landscape, and Namatjira, expressing an interest in learning to paint, acted as his cameleer and guide to show him local scenic areas. Namatjira started painting in a 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. His colours were similar to the ochres that his ancestors had used to depict the same landscape, but his style was appreciated by Europeans because it met the aesthetics of western art. In his early career, Namatjira's work included tjuringa (sacred object) designs, biblical themes and figurative subjects, and he also carved and painted various artefacts. the first painting of an Aboriginal person to win the prize. ==Artworks, style and critical reception==

Namatjira's artworks 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 Namatjira capturing the reflection in the water. 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 Namatjira 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 in Ghost Gum Glen Helen (–49). His unique style of painting was denounced soon after his death by some critics as being a product of his assimilation into western culture, rather than his own connection to his subject matter or his natural style. Although Namatjira's paintings appear similar to conventional European landscapes, his work was imbued with his feeling for country and sacred sites. He used repetition, intricate patterns and high horizons to blend the styles of the two worlds he lived in. ==Later life ==

, c. 1947 Due to his wealth, Namatjira soon found himself the subject of humbugging, a ritualised form of begging. Arrernte are expected to share everything they own, and as Namatjira's income grew, so did his extended family. At one time he was singlehandedly providing for over 600 people with financial support. To ease the burden on his strained resources, Namatjira sought to lease a cattle station to benefit his extended family. Originally granted, the lease was subsequently rejected because the land was part of a returned servicemen's ballot, and also because he had no ancestral claim on the property. He then tried to build a house in Alice Springs, but was cheated in his land dealings. The land he was sold was on a flood plain and was unsuitable for building. The Minister for Territories, Paul Hasluck, offered him free land in a reserve on the outskirts of Alice Springs, but this was rejected, and Namatjira and his family took up residence in a squalid shanty at Morris Soak, a dry creek bed some distance from Alice Springs which is now the location of one of the town camps. Despite the fact that he was held as one of Australia's greatest artists, Namatjira was living in poverty. His plight became a media cause célèbre, resulting in a wave of public outrage. In 1957 the government exempted Namatjira and his wife from the restrictive legislation that applied to Aboriginal people in the Northern Territory. Namatjira was encouraged to apply for full rights of citizenship at 55 years of age, allowing him to vote, own land, build a house and buy alcohol unlike other Indigenous Australians in the Northern Territory. He was then exempt from classification as an 'Aboriginal' for the purposes of the Welfare Ordinance 1953. When an Aboriginal woman, Fay Iowa, was killed at Morris Soak, Namatjira was held responsible by stipendiary magistrate, Jim Lemaire, for bringing alcohol into the camp. He was reprimanded at the coronial inquest. In the Northern Territory at that time, it was against the law to supply alcohol to an Aboriginal person. Namatjira was charged with leaving a bottle of rum in a place, i.e. on a car seat, where a clan brother and fellow Hermannsburg artist Henoch Raberaba, could get access to it. Convicted for an offence under the Welfare Ordinance 1953, for supplying an Aboriginal (a "ward") with liquor, he was sentenced to six months in prison. Namatjira appealed against the conviction to the Supreme Court of the Northern Territory (with his defence supported by the Council for Aboriginal Rights in Victoria). The Supreme Court upheld the conviction but reduced the sentence from six to three months. The High Court of Australia refused an application to appeal. There was widespread sympathy for Namatjira and negative publicity about the operation of the Ordinance across Australia and abroad. After the public uproar, the Minister for Territories, Paul Hasluck, intervened and the sentence was served at Papunya Native Reserve. He was released after only serving two months due to medical and humanitarian reasons. Final years and death Despondent after his incarceration, Namatjira continued to live with Rubina in a cottage at Papunya, where he suffered a heart attack. There is evidence that Albert believed that he had the bone pointed at him by a member of Fay Iowa's family (this idea of being "sung" to death was also held by Frank Clune, a popular travel writer, Aboriginal activist and organiser of Albert's whirlwind 1956 trip). After being transferred to Alice Springs hospital, Namatjira astonished his mentor Rex Battarbee by presenting him with three landscapes, with a promise of more to come; a promise unrealised. Namatjira died soon after of heart disease complicated by pneumonia on 8 August 1959 in Alice Springs. ==Legacy==

Work At the time of his death Namatjira had painted a total of around 2,000 paintings. He is hailed today as one of the greatest Australian artists and a pioneer for Aboriginal rights. Two years before his death, part of Namatjira's copyright was sold to a company in exchange for royalties. After his death, Albert Namatjira's copyright was sold by the public trustee in 1983 for , despite Namatjira's will leaving his copyright to his widow and children. The copyright was returned to the family's Albert Namatjira Trust in an October 2017 deal enabled by a donation by philanthropist Dick Smith, in the name of art dealer John Brackenreg, who was seen as having acquired the rights to Namatjira's art in 1957 in an act of exploitation. Official Namatjira was honoured on postage stamps issued by Australia Post in 1968, again in 1993 with examples of his work, and in the Namatjira Centenary stamp series in 2002. State Route 2, west of Alice Springs, is named Namatjira Drive after Namatjira, as is Namatjira Park in Clayton, Victoria. In January 2013, two gum trees that featured prominently in Namatjira's watercolours were destroyed in an arson attack, while they were in the process of being heritage-listed, in an "appalling and a tragic act of cultural vandalism". In 2015, the Twin Gums site was again nominated for heritage listing. In the arts A number of biographical films have been made about Namatjira (at least three before his death), including the 1947 documentary Namatjira the Painter. Namatjira has been the subject of numerous songs. Country star Slim Dusty was the first artist to record a tribute song, "Namatjira", in the 1960s, and Rick and Thel Carey followed up with their tribute "The Stairs That Namatjira Climbed" in 1963. Other tributes include John Williamson's "Raining on the Rock" from his 1986 album Mallee Boy and "The Camel Boy" from Chandelier of Stars (2005); "Albert Namatjira" by the Australian band Not Drowning, Waving, featured on their 1993 album, Circus, and Midnight Oil's song "Truganini" of the same year; the famous patriotic song "I Am Australian"; Archie Roach's song, "Native Born"; and the reconciliation song, "Namatjira", written by Geoff Drummond and included on the politically activist album, The Chess Set released by Pat Drummond in 2004. He appeared as himself in the feature film The Phantom Stockman. The Namatjira Project was a community cultural development project launched in 2009 that included an award-winning theatre production by Big hART focusing on Namatjira's life and work. On 28 July 2017, Google commemorated Namatjira's 115th birthday with a featured Doodle for Australian users, acknowledging his substantial contributions to the art and culture of Australia. Descendants A number of Albert Namatjira's descendants paint at the Iltja Ntjarra - Many Hands art centre in Alice Springs. Vincent Namatjira, Albert Namatjira's great-grandson, is a well-known artist in his own right, winning the Ramsay Art Prize in 2019. Vincent's 2014 series, ''Albert's Story'', reflects on Albert Namatjira's life and legacy. About the series, Vincent has stated: "I hope my grandfather would be quite proud, maybe smiling down on me; because I won't let him go. I just keep carrying him on, his name and our families' stories." The series comprises 13 artworks, telling the story of Albert's life. Vincent's work was also shortlisted for the Archibald Prize in 2017, 2018 and 2019 and won the prize in 2020. Vincent's 2021 book about his great-grandfather, featuring artworks from ''Albert's Story'', was shortlisted for a 2022 Australian Book Industry Award in the "Small Publishers' Children's Book of the Year" category. ==See also==