Description

Prescribed Text for HSC 2019-2023 – Standard Module B: Close Study of Literature

Prescribed Text for HSC 2019-2023 – EAL/D Module C: Close Study of Text

Namatjira & Ngapartji Ngapartji go right to the heart of the intersection between Indigenous and non-Indigenous experience. These stories of family, friendship, land, myth, life and death are contextualised within the social and political framework of their times. They resonate universally, yet at the same time capture unique moments in Australian history and experience.

Namatjira tells the moving story of Albert Namatjira (1902–1959). Namatjira was Australia’s most famous Indigenous watercolour artist and the first to achieve commercial success, but his story is hardly known. Albert Namatjira’s story resonates today as strongly as it did 50 years ago, providing a lens through which we can see the relationship between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians both in the past and the present.

Taking its name from the Pitjantjatjara concept of exchange and reciprocity, Ngapartji Ngapartji—co-created with Trevor Jamieson—is a deeply affecting experience of Indigenous history. Exploring themes of dispossession and displacement from country, home and family, the play tells the story of a Pitjantjatjara family forcibly moved off their lands to make way for the testing of British atomic bombs at Maralinga.

About the Author

SCOTT RANKIN is a writer, director and creative director of the renowned arts organisation, Big hART. Rankin wrote the highly acclaimed works Box The Pony for Leah Purcell, Riverland for Wesley Enoch and Ngapartji Ngapartji for Trevor Jamieson. Big hART is Rankin’s passionate contribution to the arts and society – the company has won eight Coalition of Australian Governments (COAG) Awards, the 2008 Myer Performing Arts Group Award as well as an AFI Award and a World Health Organisation Award. He has received many high accolades and awards including: two Premier’s Literary awards, three Green Room Awards including Most Innovative Production and Best Direction, as well as a Human Rights Award (arts). He has been awarded the Ros Bower Award for outstanding achievement in services to community cultural development, and has received a Fellowship from the Australia Council for the Arts.