Third eye
1986
Medium
synthetic polymer paint on canvas
Measurements
91.4 × 71.0 cm
Credit Line
National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
The Joseph Brown Collection. Presented through the NGV Foundation by Dr Joseph Brown AO OBE, Honorary Life Benefactor, 2004
© Trevor Nickolls/Licensed by Copyright Agency, Australia
Gallery location
Gallery 20
Level 3, NGV Australia
About this work
Trevor Nickolls held his first solo exhibition, From Dreamtime to Machinetime in Canberra in 1977. The exhibition title crystallised a central preoccupation of his work, the conflict between Dreamtime – his strong sense of Aboriginal identity, spirituality and affinity with land; and Machinetime – the ambivalent impact of the dominant, colonising culture, and its enticing machines, materialism and technological advancement. In this work, the eye set within the pyramid refers to Egyptian art, and is a symbol embedded with ancient universal alphabets, expressive of Nickolls’s aim to ‘bridge the gap between Western art and Aboriginal art’.
Artwork Details
Place/s of Execution
Adelaide, South Australia
Accession Number
2004.249
Department
First Nations Australia
This digital record has been made available on NGV Collection Online through the generous support of The Vizard Foundation