Summary

This item is one of our 50 Treasures: Celebrating 50 years of James Cook University.

Professor Stephen Naylor answers the question 'Why is this significant?'

The lithograph entitled Figures in a Landscape, 1964 by the late Sir Russell Drysdale AC, captures three Indigenous figures standing within the Australian outback. The work donated by Ms Elaine Petherbridge provides a context within early formation of the James Cook University Art collection under the stewardship of Ron Kenny, who sought to create a unique chapter in Australian art history, seeking out a recognisable north Queensland presence.

Russell Drysdale was born in Sussex in 1912, migrating to Australia in 1923. His family were substantial pastoralists with Russell spending time in the Western District of Victoria, the Riverina, and sometime in north Queensland working within the sugar industry. While his training was largely based in the European Modernist tradition, Drysdale gravitated towards exploring the figure in the landscape with a deliberate focus on social representation and a way of commenting on life in the Australian outback.

In Figures in a Landscape, 1964 Drysdale explores space and presence; the figures both float and blend into the subtle textual effects of the craggy foreground, sparse mid-ground and whispering horizon gently capturing the distance acknowledging the Indigenous past and anticipating a future.

The work is important in recognising Drysdale's concerted effort to bring the Australian Aborigine from the periphery back as a central motif within the Australian landscape. There is also a sense of tragedy within many of Drysdale's works-not the nostalgic view of the fallen hero as in the case with the European in the Australian outback, but rather the figure not quite fitting in, although being respectful in a harsh landscape. However, when portraying the Indigenous figure, a sense of affinity and belonging is the basis of the portrayal, of being at one with the land. Drysdale saw a peculiar dignity and grace within the Aboriginal people, one where they were both alone and at ease despite their dispossession and despoliation.

This landscape was not to be derided for its antithesis to the landscapes of the northern hemisphere, but rather to be celebrated as a place where Europeans could learn from the Indigenous custodians not just about the physicality of the land but of its philosophy and spirit.