Brush with the Lore

Trevor Nickolls was a pioneering Ngarrindjeri artist whose remarkable career spanned four decades, until his untimely death in 2012 at the age of sixty-three.  He was one of the first Aboriginal artists to represent Australia at the Venice Biennale, exhibiting in 1990 alongside the renowned Kukatja/Wangkatjunga painter, Rover Thomas. Nickolls’s paintings provide an important social commentary and were among the first to portray the harsh realities of contemporary life from an Aboriginal perspective.

Brush with the Lore presents the complex relationships that have existed between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people in Australia and articulates how the resulting tragedies of the past continue into the present. Included are references to the Stolen Generations, atomic bomb testing in South Australia, Aboriginal deaths in custody, the many different laws that Aboriginal people have to navigate and the effects of enforced religion on Aboriginal people’s cultural beliefs.

Nickolls composed the work as if the viewer is in a theatre, looking at the stage. The central focus of this busy and loaded scene is a boab tree, personified as a member of the clergy, who has imprisoned Nickolls himself. Surrounding this are intricate and finely executed images that share his personal connection to the stories they depict.

Through his unique way of expressing his personal experiences, Nickolls empowered many Aboriginal artists to share their stories.

Nici Cumpston, Senior Curator, Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Art / Artistic Director Tarnanthi