Vic: Clifford Possum work expected to set record

AAP General News (Australia)
04-17-2007
Vic: Clifford Possum work expected to set record

MELBOURNE, April 17 AAP - Clifford Possum Tjapaltjarri's majestic Warlugulong is expected
to make art history as the most expensive Aboriginal painting sold when it goes to auction
later this year.

Sotheby's is hoping the epic canvas will fetch between $1.8 to $2.5 million in July.

That amount would far exceed the current record of almost $780,000 set by a Rover Thomas
painting in 2001.

The previous record for Clifford Possum work is just under $412,000.

The massive work, two metres high and more than three metres wide, is considered one
of the most significant Western Desert "dot" paintings held in a private collection.

Sotheby's director of Aboriginal Art Tim Klingender said Clifford Possum broke new
ground in the work by blending indigenous and European visual conventions.

"He basically mapped his country from an aerial perspective using traditional motifs
and concepts but also informed by western maps," Mr Klingender said.

"It allows non-indigenous people to see the way that indigenous people see the landscape."

The painting's main subject is the Fire Dreaming, an ancestral story that recurs in
Clifford Possum's work.

It tells the story of two brothers who spear a kangaroo and eat all of it themselves
instead of sharing it with their father.

Angered by their selfishness, their father, who is the ancestor of the blue-tongued
lizard, creates a massive bushfire that engulfs and destroys his sons.

But the masterpiece contains up to nine other ancestral narratives and also plots key
features in Clifford Possum's traditional country.

The work will tour New York, London and Sydney before it goes to auction on July 24.

But even if it goes to an international buyer it would need federal government approval
before it could leave Australia.

AAP nl/dk/cjh/bwl

KEYWORD: POSSUM (PIX AVAILABLE)

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