Heroes of Colonial Encounters - Mickie

Artist Helen S Tiernan (born 1952)

Date2017

Object number00055135

NamePainting

MediumOil on canvas

DimensionsOverall: 365 × 262 × 20 mm

ClassificationsArt

Credit LineANMM Collection

Terms

DescriptionA painting of Mickie from the Awabakal people of the Newcastle and Lake Macquarie region in New South Wales by Helen S Tiernan. This painting is part of a series of portraits that make up 'Heroes of Colonial Encounters'. The painting is based on one of a series historic portraits made in 1836 by William Fernyhough who was an assistant surveyor and architect under Major Thomas Mitchell. Fernyhough produced numerous sketches of Indigenous people in New South Wales, giving them anglicized names. In Helen S Tiernan's work she combines European heroes such as Cook, Banks, Bligh, Phillip and Flinders with their Indigenous contemporaries - Bennelong, Bungaree, Truganini, Colby, Bidgee Bidgee and Ballodere. Here all figures are now shown as equals - no longer separated by European colonial ideas that cast Indigenous people as 'Primitives'. HistoryIn the series of works 'Heroes of Colonial Encounters' Helen S Tiernan explores national identity and the singular European view of colonial history and the way Indigenous peoples are depicted as the 'primitive' or 'other'. The portraits she paints of Bennelong, Bungaree, Colby, Bidgee Bidgee, Ballodere and Mickie sees them equal to their European contemporaries such as Cook, Joseph Banks, William Bligh, Arthur Philip and Matthew Flinders. All portraits are to hang together on the same wall, equally ornate, equal in style and equal in history. The only differences in the treatment of the subjects are the shape of the frame. Indigenous heroes are depicted in oval frames while European men are shown in square and more informal frames. Mickie, sometimes referred to as 'Mickey', was an Awabakal man people of the Newcastle region. Experiencing the devastating effects of the first wave of European colonisation in that area, it is recorded that Mickie/Mickey was captured, tried and sentenced to death by the colonial authorities for the alleged rape of an English woman in 1835. Faced with his death sentence Mickie was visited by the priest Lancelot Threlkeld. Threlkeld had been a strong advocator for the Awabakal people, often going against the local European community and government. But his attempts to convert Mickie to Christianity failed as Mickie held true to his traditional Awabakal beliefs and refused to concede. SignificanceThis painting of Mickie by Helen S Tiernan provides a dual perspective of histories and first encounters in Australia and through the Pacific. Most post-colonial art takes its subject from earlier colonial times, but this doesn’t mean their interests are purely historical. To the contrary, the point of post-colonialism is to show how many unresolved issues from colonial history are embedded in the present.