Silence and slow time
Nicolas Rothwell;10/5/08
They Are Meditating: Bark Paintings from the MCA’s Arnott’s Collection; Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney.
In the mid-1960s, Jerome Gould, an American graphic artist with a keen eye and a taste for adventure, took a series of field trips into the remote terrain of Arnhem Land. Gould was a collector; he had a big budget and a strong visual sense: indeed, his innovative design for Michelob beer bottles was all the rage just then. He chartered light aircraft and flew through the north, snapping up early masterpieces of Aboriginal bark painting from missionary settlement craft shops. During those years, in the margins of his journeys, he did contract design work for Arnott’s Biscuits. So, by a strange and convoluted chain of circumstances, was born one of Australia’s greatest and least-known holdings of indigenous art.
See: http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,23654148-16947,00.html
Tags: Aboriginal, Arts, Australia