Natural earth pigments and bush gum on canvas

Painted in 1990
Mary Macha, Subiaco, Western Australia
Private Collection, Venice, Italy

Overall excellent and stable condition with no repairs or restoration. Small areas of pigment loss in the white dots in areas along the outer margins due to the painting's handling prior to framing. Minimalist brown wood frame.
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The site of Billiluna holds particular personal significance for the artist, for it was here that he was initiated into traditional law. Rover Thomas was born at Kunawarritji in the Gibson Desert, also known at Well 33 on the Canning Stock Route. The Stock Route was established early in the Twentieth Century to take cattle from the eastern Kimberley to markets in the south. The Route, which runs for over 1,000 miles, caused a diaspora among Aboriginal groups along its length. As a youth Thomas was taken hundreds of mile north to work as a stockman at Billuluna cattle station in the Tanami Desert, at the northern end of the Route. Here, the landscape is remarkable for what Aboriginal people term the ‘milky water’ along Sturt Creek which runs through Billuluna. After rains, the clay soils turn the water white and the land is covered in temporary streams and patches of white water, rendered here in Thomas painting by his use of a distinctive impasto white pigment which itself is a type of clay.

This painting was acquired by the vendor, a Venetian collector, from the artist’s agent Mary Macha in 1990, the year in which Rover Thomas, along with Trevor Nickolls (1949-2012), represented Australia at the Venice Biennale, the first Aboriginal artists to do so.

WC