Harold Thomas
Harold Thomas
Born: 1947
Region: Alice Springs, Western Desert
Community Centre: Darwin
Language Bloc: Western Desert
Language: Luritja, Wombaya,
Medium/ Form: Oil painting, watercolour painting
Designs:
The National Aboriginal flag. (Harold owns the copyright).
Awards:
1984, Third Prize, Inaugural National Aboriginal Art Award,
Northern Territory Museum of Arts and Sciences, Darwin
Commissions:
1992, Portraits of Parliamentarians, Darwin NT
Select Bibliography ATSIC News Spring 1991. West, M., 1984, 'The
first national Aboriginal art Award', in Australian Aboriginal
Studies, Journal of the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and
Torres Strait Islander Studies, 1984, No. 1.
Collections:
Art Gallery of Western Australia, Perth.
Flinders University Art Museum, Adelaide.
Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory, Darwin.
Northern Territory Chief Ministers Department.
Queensland Art Gallery, Brisbane.
Individual Exhibitions:
1968, Adelaide, solo exhibition, opened by Don Dunstan, SA
1977, Arnhemland Aboriginal Art Gallery, Darwin, NT
1978, Heritage Aboriginal Art Gallery, Darwin, NT
1985, Esplanade Gallery, Darwin, NT
1986, The Parap Gallery, Darwin, NT
1986, Raintree Gallery, Darwin, NT
1987, Birukmarri Gallery, Fremantle, WA
1987, Esplanade Gallery, Darwin, NT
1988, The Showcase Gallery, Darwin, NT
1988, Caz Gallery, Los Angeles, USA
1989, Masterworks Exhibition, Raintree Gallery, Darwin, NT
Group Exhibitions:
1984, The First National Aboriginal Art Award Exhibition, Museum
and Art Gallery of NT, Darwin
1985, The Second National Aboriginal Art Award Exhibition, Museum
and Art Gallery of the NT, Darwin
1990, Balance 1990: views, visions, influences, QAG, Brisbane.
1993, The Tenth National Aboriginal Art Award Exhibition, Museum
and Art Gallery of the NT, Darwin
Aboriginal Flag
Harold Thomas - Creator of the Aboriginal Flag
Broadcast 6.30pm on 25/3/2002
Harold Thomas is a noted Aboriginal activist and artist. One of his best known designs
is the Aboriginal Flag. This simple banner represents strength and passion and has become
the emblem for Aboriginal Australians.
HAROLD THOMAS, ARTIST & DESIGNER OF THE ABORIGINAL FLAG:
I was born in a small town called Alice Springs in the late-'40s or mid-'40s. And, uh, it was a
beautiful place. But I only spent seven years of my life there and we lived in a segregated area
called the Cottages where part-Aboriginals were to live in specially built houses called the
Cottages. Whites lived in town. Bush people lived out on the missions and stations.
Well, I'm one out of 13 children. And now I have about 22 nieces and nephews, you know, and so
forth. But, yeah, we've got a big family. But the sad thing about our family, we -- we weren't
all housed under the same roof.
We were removed as children at different stages. The trauma of that as well as not seeing your
mother again, virtually -- But I was fortunate -- I saw her once later on. But you know, your
mother's love is the first great love that a person can have. First, I was institutionalised in
Alice Springs with my sisters. I was fostered at 12 to a white family, a priest, a Church of
England person, lovely people, until I was -- went to art school from there until I was about 20.
I've been involved with the stolen generation for the last seven or -- well, since it began in
the Northern Territory. And that's an experience, to listen to other people's hardships. But that's
helped me as well because I've never analysed it carefully or in detail, but being with other
people who have been removed does help. But, yeah, it's, uh -- it's an ongoing thing about dealing
with that. But it's not about blame or guilt or anything. It's about dealing with it, and hopefully,
it will help, you know, my family, my children and that to understand what happened to their father.
But I made a decision about going to art school, because, I thought, "At least I won't be on my own,
I won't have non-aboriginals telling me what to do." As an institutionalised person, that was really
hard to come to terms with. But I persevered, and in the end I got my diploma of fine arts. And it
was a great experience, because it was during the '60s, and during the period of change for a lot of
young people throughout the world. And if I were to live again, I'd want to, because it was a great
time for young people.
I applied for a job at the South Australian Museum, where I became the first Aboriginal to be employed
in a museum in Australia. I was with the biggest collection of Aboriginal art -- artefact in the world,
and I had virtually free access to it. So I gleaned over every artefact, every design. I sort of went
back into it and felt, "There's something powerful and strong here that should be expressed."
So it went on from there -- it was a sequence of events which led to me being the designer of the
Aboriginal flag. When I look carefully at what the Aboriginal flag looks like, it comes from the
simplicity and power of Aboriginal art itself. Simple colour, choice of colour, and a simple design.
It's powerful, and the colours are important. And it took some time to think about it -- Red ochre,
the red soil -- the country of Australia is all red.
Why I chose the sun? Because it's another colour that is used commonly in Aboriginal art -- yellow ochre.
But the sun is a great symbol for all people. When we look carefully at the colour black, which is an
interesting one, it's more of a political inclusion, rather than a spiritual, Aboriginal concept. The
black represents the pride of being black in Australia. Because, at the time, black pride came into
Australian culture -- during the '60s and '70s -- influenced by Black American pride of their culture.
If this is going to be an Aboriginal flag, it has to have black, because it represents the black people
of the continent.
When we looked back, a lot of people were ashamed of their Aboriginal identity, because of that
suppression. Well, the flag kind of helped that.
They said, "At least, if I can wear it on myself, wear a T-shirt with it, or the colours, it's a signal
to other people in the community I'm proud I'm Aboriginal, I'm proud to wear the colours." And that's
important -- I like that. Now and again, I see a non-Aboriginal wear it, and that's even -- good too.
I enjoy that. It's not just exclusively Aboriginal. It's got a life of it's own. It's everywhere.
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