Glen Helen Gorge - Albert Namatjira

Albert Namatjira began painting in the early 1930s and his aptitude in capturing the high colouring of the desert landscape, the gorges and valleys of the country of his birth and his Dreaming, brought him instant success.

He typically painted his desert country from a slightly elevated point of view, as if looking down, ever so slightly on the landscape. He was able to capture the subtleties of colour as the desert changes from the soft tones of summer heat, to the rich colours of the early morning and late evening light. The majority of his paintings lack a central focal point yet a visual emphasis on the edges holds the composition in balance without either a dominance of forms near the centre or a hierarchy of forms’.

While he is 'often characterised as a tragic figure trapped between two worlds and two art traditions' Albert Namatjira’s paintings of the Western MacDonnell Ranges, Mount Sonder and the surrounding desert have endured to become synonymous with a romantic vision of the Australian outback.