Papunya

A Place Made After the Story

Geoffrey Bardon, James Bardon
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Papunya

A Place Made After the Story

Geoffrey Bardon, James Bardon
A stunning new edition of the art classic
Papunya: A Place Made After the Story is a first-hand account of the Papunya Tula artists and their internationally significant works emanating from the central Western Desert This momentous movement began in 1971 when Geoffrey Bardon, a hopeful young art teacher, drove the long lonely road from Alice Springs to the settlement at Papunya in the Northern Territory. He left only eighteen months later, defeated by hostile white authority, but a lasting legacy was the emergence of the Western Desert painting style. It started as an exercise to encourage local children to record their sand patterns and games, and grew to include tribal men and elders painting depictions of their ceremonial lives onto scraps of discarded building materials. With Bardon's support, they preserved their traditional Dreamings and stories in paint. The artistic energy unleashed at Papunya spread through Central Australia to achieve international acclaim. These works are now regarded as…
Papunya: A Place Made After the Story is a first-hand account of the Papunya Tula artists and their internationally significant works emanating from the central Western Desert. This momentous movement began in 1971 when Geoffrey Bardon, a hopeful young art teacher, drove the long lonely road from Alice Springs to the settlement at Papunya in the Northern Territory. He left only eighteen months later, defeated by hostile white authority, but a lasting legacy was the emergence of the Western Desert painting style. It started as an exercise to encourage local children to record their sand patterns and games, and grew to include tribal men and elders painting depictions of their ceremonial lives onto scraps of discarded building materials. With Bardon's support, they preserved their traditional Dreamings and stories in paint. The artistic energy unleashed at Papunya spread through Central Australia to achieve international acclaim. These works are now regarded as some of Australia's most treasured cultural, historical and artistic items. The publication of this material is an unprecedented achievement. Bardon's exquisitely recorded notes and drawings reproduced here document the early stages in this important art group. This landmark book features more than five hundred paintings, drawings and photographs from Bardon's personal archive. It tells the story of the catalyst for a powerfully modern expression of an ancient indigenous way of seeing the world.

This book is a kind of Bible of Aboriginal Art. It is grandiose in scale, defining in its pictorial record, and rich in narrative momentum.”
The Age

A priceless record of discovery and creation.”
TIME magazine

Papunya: A Place Made After the Story gives the view from inside the painting room. Its gilded words and images remain like a desert sunset in the mind.”
The Australian

A monumental triumph in the documentation of the early years of the Papunya phenomenon.”
The Canberra Times

Geoffrey Bardon

Geoffrey Bardon

Geoffrey Robert Bardon was born in Sydney in 1940. He was educated at the University of Sydney, where he studied law for three years, and the National Art School, Sydney, where for four years he studied art education before graduating in 1966. He taught art at various New South Wales regional high schools before taking up a posting to Papunya in the Northern Territory in 1971. He worked closely with the Indigenous painters who became…

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James Bardon

James Bardon is the older brother of Geoffrey Bardon. After Geoffrey's death he helped realise this, Geoffrey's last book. He was a practicing solicitor in New South Wales and author of the prize-winning novel Revolution by Night (1991). James Bardon has been associated with his brother and Western Desert art for many years; he was the producer of A Calendar of Dreamings and the co-writer of Mick and the Moon.

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Hardback
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Ships in 1–3 days