Australian Aboriginal Art

THE PETER LOS COLLECTION : JOURNEY THROUGH THE “TIME OF DREAMS”

30 April 2008

On July 7 the first-ever sale of Aboriginal Art at Artcurial | Briest - Poulain - F. Tajan. It will be the most important ensemble ever to come to auction outside Australia.

Some sixty works from the personal collection of Peter Los will be offered, with an overall estimate of €600,000. The collection, amassed over a 20-year period through ties of friendship and common experiences shared with Aboriginal communities in the Outback, constitutes a unique, pioneering look at Aboriginal art.

Each painting was acquired directly from individual artists known personally by Los. All possess the finest possible certificate of authenticity : the verbally transmitted story behind the work, worth far more than its mere iconographical interpretation. And seen though the eyes of friendship.

Peter Los was a trusted interlocutor of the first Aboriginal artistic communities to paint in acrylic back in the 1970s, and swiftly chose to devote himself to the study of their special type of painting. He has shared his passion with a host of collectors around the globe by staging exhibitions in Australia, Canada, London and Geneva, and is now recognized as one of the leading specialists in the field by both artists and institutions.

His collection evokes the stories and images of the Western Desert, from the Papunya Tula Art Centre to the Panunya Warumpi Art Centre via the Yuendumu and Utopia communities, and also includes the work of independent artists such as Clifford Possum Tjapaltjarri, Eunice Napangardi and Gabriella Possum Nungarrayi, to name but a few.

Among the artists closest to Peter Los was Clifford Possum Tjapaltjarri (c.1932-2002), a major figure from the first generation of painters to work in acrylic, and represented at the sale by five major paintings – including Love Story at Ngarlu (1992), a masterpiece worthy of any museum (est. €240,000-260,000).

The works on offer perpetuate the “Time of Dreams” on canvas, reflecting the continued existence of an ancestral culture which, anthropologists believe, dates back at least 60,000 years. These contemporary artists derive their inspiration from the spirituality at the heart of Aboriginal culture, and capture a timeless, sacred geography, both physical and imaginary, in compositions which appear abstract to the eyes of the uninitiated… Pointilliste constellations, labyrinths of signs, concentric circles, and wavy bands symbolically convey the mythical accounts of the spirits which forged the land of Australia – and an Aboriginal identity that remains intact despite two centuries of colonization.

PETER LOS : A PASSION FOR ABORIGINAL CULTURE

Peter Los was born in Blind River – an Ojibwa Indianvillage in northern Ontario – and grew up in 1960s Canada.

His earliest contacts with aboriginal art date back to his childhood, and the Inuit sculpture he saw at home. His father was a learned collector of aboriginal art, and passed on his knowledge of, and enthusiasm for, soapstone carvings to Peter at a very early age.

But it was his encounter with the aboriginal art of Australia that would radically alter the course of Peter’s life.

His work as a geologist brought him to the uncharted lands of the Great Sandy Desertin Western Australia, where Los and his team of seismologists discovered secret caves and ancient galleries lined with rock paintings – primitive evidence of human presence.

Los realized he was the first “non-indigenous” person to enter the caves and, given the importance of his discovery, swiftly alerted State experts. This led to an unprecedented assembly of Aborigines, anthropologists, cartographers and government representatives, where tribes debated questions of status, heritage and ownership linked to the nature of the rock paintings. Los took an active part in the discussions. The experience gave his life a new direction. He bought his first dot painting, moved to Alice Springs, and abandoned geology to devote himself to Aboriginal art and culture.

Peter Los shared the daily life of Aborigines in the Outback, building bridges between native communities and the outside world. Aborigines showed him respect and confidence, and told him their stories. Los would devote his life to showing their art to the public, and spreading awareness of their history, their hopes, and their fundamentally spiritual identity.

He organized his first exhibitions in the 1980s, starting with a show in Sydney devoted to artists from Queensland. In Canada, he worked with the same passion to spread the message among institutions, dealers and collectors, staging an exhibition in Vancouver that attracted international attention, soon followed by other exhibitions around the country. He became good friends with the late Clifford Possum Tjapaltjarri, now world-famous as one of the leading figures of contemporary Aboriginal art.

Los’s relationship with the Aborigines soon developed across the entire Western Desert. He was invited to the Papunya Tula Art Centre; became close to the Yuendumu and Willowra Warlipi communities; and met the Pintupi group, becoming friends with Turkey Tolsen. Back in the cities, he grew close to such independent Aboriginal artists as Nosepeg Tjupurrula, Pansy Napangati, Maxie Tlampitjinpa, Eunice Napangardi and Johnny Warangkula Tjupurrula, to name but a few.

With his expertise in the field of contemporary Aboriginal art widely acknowledged, Los was involved in major exhibitions in Australia and Europe – in Brisbane, Canberra, Perth, Melbourne, then in London and Geneva, opening the path to international recognition for Aboriginal artists and their culture.

Just like his adventure amongst the Aborigines, the collection built up by Peter Los over a period of more than 20 years is unique – now continued with artists of the next generation…

JOURNEY TO THE “TIME OF DREAMS”

For over 50,000 years, the Aboriginal art of Australia has followed the thread of sacred dreams. Whether on stone, sand, ritual objects or the body, then ultimately canvas, it has never ceased to celebrate the work of those who created the Australian land, crossing the immense desert from one end to the other. The footprints of these ancestral beings – mileposts along a symbolical, geographical trail – have formed dreams, taking their place in the mind, where they are updated once more.

From generation to generation, the dream rekindles the past and leads to journeys whose story and images form the very basis of Aboriginal art and identity. In dreams formed by secret graphic compositions linked to each tribe’s territory, certain individuals are charged by their ancestors to reproduce these journeys to ensure the group’s spiritual initiation.

Contemporary Aboriginal painting – an encounter between millennial spirituality and modern artistic forms – brings these images, conveyed as dreams, to the eyes of the world…

The story begins out in the desert in 1971, when Geoffrey Bardon, a white professor who had settled among the Papunya Community, suggested that young Aborigines use acrylic and canvas to decorate their school with episodes from the Dream of the Honey Ant. Once these works were exhibited, they caught the attention of the “initiated bearers of the portrayal of this dream” and made them want to experiment with these new materials. Given the beauty and success of these nascent paintings, and despite the reticence of the authorities, the artists decided to form a co-operative: the Papunya Tula Artists Pty Ltd. In the mid-80s, the initiative spread to the main communities of the Kimberley and the Central Australian Desert. The art of the indigenous nomadic population was produced, with unprecedented force and freedom, in the very camps where they were forced to assimilate and adopt a sedentary way of life.

Painting became a symbol of identity and resistance. Self-expression, in acrylic on canvas, became a way of perpetuating an age-old spiritual heritage – and cocking a snook at two centuries of colonial dominance. When part of their territory was returned in the early 1980s, Aborigines referred specifically to motifs contained within these paintings to affirm their rights to Australian soil, calling upon a primitive topography of the continent memorized down the centuries in the time of dream.

While making use of new materials and new pictorial matter, contemporary Aboriginal painting remains close to the traditional painting from which it is essentially derived. The dot or pointilliste technique, which comes from the tradition of using sticks covered in natural pigments to cover the painted area with a sea of dots, remains one of its principal characteristics. True to the tradition of painting on the ground, these works continue to be realized on a flat surface that shows the earth as seen from the sky – from its widest expanses down to the tiniest plots of land. To this day only the initiated have the calling to paint, and each maintains the right to certain dreams, with their style of painting sufficing as their signature.

With contemporary Aboriginal art increasingly recognized by international institutions and the art market, these artists continue to be accepted in the eyes of their peers and of the enthusiastic travellers who have managed to embrace and understand Aboriginal painting, creating dream-like passages between Aboriginal art and the world at large.

A FRESH LOOK AT CONTEMPORARY ABORIGINAL PAINTING

Independent Artists

Chief of the artists close to Peter Los was Clifford Possum Tjapaltjarri (Anmateyrre, c.1932-2002), a member of the first generation to paint on canvas. The acknowledged master of Papunya Tula recently set a world record price for an Aboriginal work of art at €1.5m, in Sydney in July 2007, after setting an earlier record in Melbourne back in 1995.

The sale is dominated by his museum-quality masterpiece Love Story at Ngarlu (1992), acrylic on canvas 1.53 x 1.22m (est. €240,000-400,000). This sees Clifford Possum Tjapaltjarri return to one of the first stories to inspire him. He was the first painter to illustrate it, in 1972, and it remains the most expensive of his subjects. This story (traditionally sung) tells of forbidden love and a literally inflammatory erotic spell. Peter Los acquired the work from the artist in 1992, leading to a revealing discussion between the two men (published in Vivien Johnson’s pioneering monograph on Clifford Possum Tjapaltjarri in 1994).

Four other major works by Clifford Possum Tjapaltjarri will be offered at Artcurial: The Two Tjungalas Bushfire Dreaming (1999), 1.83 x 1.21m, revealing a more personal side to the artist’s work (est. €48,000-80,000); Possum Dreaming at Napperby (1996), 82 x 126cm (est. €27,000-40,000); Worm Dreaming (1997), 121 x 91cm (est. €18,000-30,000); and Bush Tucker and Kangaroo Dreaming at Mount Dennison (1993), 63 x 82cm (est. €10,800-18,000).

Also close to Peter Los was Eunice Napangardi (Warlipi, c.1940-2005), a major artist with whom Los became friends back in 1989, and represented at the sale by two paintings inspired by the same dream: Bush Banana Dreaming (1990), acrylic on canvas 55 x 59cm (est. €2400); and Bush Banana Dreaming (2000), acrylic 1.33 x 4.64m (est. €36,000-60,000).

Reflecting the close ties between Peter Los and the younger generation, Clifford Possum’s daughter Gabriella Possum Nungarrayi (born Luritja/Anmateyrre 1967) is represented by four work, including two remarkable large formats: Seven Sisters Dreaming (2008), acrylic on canvas 2.97 x 4.98m, illustrating the famous adventure of seven sisters pursued throughout the land by an old man, before begging to escape their plight by being turned into a constellation (est. €10,800-18,000); and Bush Tucker Dreaming – My Father’s Country (2007-08), acrylic on canvas 2.98 x 4.77m, revealing the fertility of Aboriginal land, laden with fruit and flowers, and the places women have made their own (est. €15,000-25,000). A film documentary was made recording every step of the painting’s production.
The two smaller works, in acrylic on pre-printed white canvas, date from 2007: Seven Sisters Dreaming, 1.83 x 1.21m (est. €3000); and Grandmother’s Country, 1.03 x 1.15m (est. €1800).

Artists from the Papunya Tula Community Art Centre

The Papunya Tula Art Centre, which became the first co-operative founded by an artists’ community in 1972, is regarded as the birthplace of contemporary Aboriginal painting. Its artists are extensively represented in the Peter Los Collection.

The Pintupi of Papunya, descendants of the last tribe to discover western civilization, retrace their epopee through the cycle of time… With their radiating spheres, symbolizing the journeys and encampments of the desert region’s earliest inhabitants, Pintupi Tingari count among the most sacred symbols of Aboriginal culture. Take Tingari Cycle at Pulitjilka (1996) by Turkey Tolson Tjupurrula (Pintupi c.1943-2001), a splendid acrylic on canvas 153 x 91cm (est. €18,000-30,000). Other highlights include Tingari Cycle at Tjuln (1995), 137 x 91cm, by Warlimpirriga Tjapaltjarri (born Pintupi 1958); and Kuninka (Western Quoli) Dreaming at Kaakaratintja (1987) by Yala Yala Gibbs Tjungurrayi (Pintupi, c.1924-98), acrylic on canvas 87 x 27cm. Each work is expected to fetch €4800-8000. Then there is Rockhole at Malparingya (1999) by Nyilyari Tjapangati (born Pintupi c.1969), acrylic on canvas 61 x 31cm (est. €1500-2500).

Peter Los feels the work of his friend Maxie Tjampitjinpa (Warlipi, 1945-77) is characterized by “a secret way of painting and the special way he holds his brush.” Tjampitjinpa, known as the “father of contemporary Aboriginal art,” was one of the most talented Papunya Tula artists. His works at the sale include Water Dreaming at Watulpuya (1992), acrylic on canvas 1.22 x 1.22m (est. €5400); and Bush Fire Dreaming at Warlurkulanga (1995), 112 x 55cm (est. €4500-7500).

Artists from the Papunya/Warumpi Community Art Centre

Johnny Warrangkula Tjupurrula (Luritja, c.1918–2001) invokes the elements and rain dance in his Water Dreaming at Kalipinpa (1998), acrylic on canvas 182 x 80cm (est. €10,800-18,000).

Yuendumu Community – Warlukurlangu Association of Aboriginal Artists

The Yuendumu Community will be represented, above all, by Maggie Watson Napangardi (born Warlipi c.1925) and her 1990 Ngalyipi Jukurrpa (Snake Vine Dreaming), acrylic on canvas 91 x 91cm (est. €9000-15,000).

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Sale Info

Sale: 1506

Location: Hôtel Dassault

Date: 7 July 2008

Viewing

4 to 6 July 2008, 11am-7pm

Hôtel Dassault
7 rond-point des Champs-Élysées
75008 Paris

Sale Consultant

Marc Jallon

Contact

Véronique-Alexandrine Hussain

Phone +33 1 42 99 16 13

Press Contact

Armelle Maquin

Phone +33 1 43 14 05 69

Mob. +33 6 11 70 44 74

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