- Museum number
- Oc2006,Drg.24
- Title
- Object: Neptune + his son Moriarty, Circular Head, Flinders
- Description
-
Drawing; it depicts 'Neptune' (Reinderberg), a Tasmanian Aboriginal man, sitting with his son Moriarty. Both are wearing shirt and trousers. 1845
Graphite
- Production date
- 1845
- Dimensions
-
Height: 24.80 centimetres
-
Width: 18.80 centimetres
- $Inscriptions
-
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- Curator's comments
-
According to Robert Clark, the catechist at Flinders Island, Neptune's Aboriginal name was 'Reinderberg', meaning hail stones. See BM Pic Doc 171.
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It is one of a series of twenty one portraits of Tasmanian Aboriginal people completed by Prout during a visit to the Wybalenna Aboriginal Station on Flinders Island in February and March 1845.
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"Neptune born near Circular Head, in the Country belonging to Wymerie - he has seen at different periods a number of sealing men kill his countrymen, and has been fired at himself very often - was afraid of the White men - came to George’s Town, and was sent to Swan Island, and ultimately to Flinders, where he married - has two children living, and three dead." - From notes given to Prout in 1845 by Robert Clark, Catechist at Wybalenna, Flinders Island (contained in Ethdoc 915).
- Location
- Not on display
- Exhibition history
-
Exhibited:
2015-2016 27 Nov-28 Mar, Canberra, National Museum of Australia, Encounters
2018 11 May - 28 July, Canberra, National Gallery of Australia, The National Picture
2018 17 Aug - 11 Nov, Hobart, Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery, The National Picture
- Condition
- Window mounted, in good condition.
- Acquisition notes
- In 1856 the artist John Skinner Prout sold Joseph Barnard Davis a collection of 36 of his portraits of Australian Aborigines and Maori people. After Davis's death in 1881, these portraits, along with other pictorial and ethnographic material, were acquired by the British Museum.
- Department
- Africa, Oceania and the Americas
- Registration number
- Oc2006,Drg.24
- Additional IDs
-
Miscellaneous number: Oc2006-Drg24-Pro
