Rover Thomas (1926)

Professions: Painter

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  ROVER THOMAS (JOOLAMA) CIRCA 1926-1998

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  ROVER THOMAS CIRCA1926-1998 RAIN CLOUD 1990

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  ROVER (JOOLAMA) THOMAS (CIRCA 1926-1998)

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  ROVER THOMAS (JOOLAMA) , CIRCA 1926-1998 RUBY PLAINS MASSACRE Natural earth pigments and binders (bush gums) on canvas

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Rover Thomas Biography

(b Kintore Ranges, 1926). Australian Aboriginal painter. He belonged to the Joolama sub-section of the Kukatja Aboriginal group. From an early age he experienced rapid social change as sheep and cattle stations took over much traditional Aboriginal land. He was a stock worker for a number of years, but following government legislation in 1968, whereby many Aboriginal stock workers were sacked, he brought his family to Turkey Creek or ‘Warmun’, in the Kimberley Ranges area, in 1975. After first composing a song cycle (the Krill Krill series, 1975) recounting dreamed images of a sequence of sacred sites, which Thomas’s uncle Paddy Jaminji depicted on painted boards, Thomas began painting boards himself in the early 1980s. He then started using canvas, and interest in his work encouraged him to devote considerable time to painting. His themes broadened rapidly but continued to express the Kimberley landscape as well as real or mythological events of history. His paintings are often sombre in mood, and use negative space to create drama. They are all marked by broad brush strokes, producing bold blocks of colour outlined in fine lines of white dots. In Roads Meeting (ochres on canvas, 0.9*1.8 m, 1986; Canberra, N.G.), the canvas is divided diagonally by two roads, and two hands are depicted outstretched. While the work may be reminiscent of former Aboriginal habitation and cave paintings, Thomas’s inclusion of two actual ‘stop’ signs at the crossroads is a symbolic statement about control and movement through the land. Thomas’s success and the support of the arts organization Waringarri Arts at Warmun have helped to engender an active artistic community there.

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