First citizen: Albert Namatjira

First Citizen charts the life of aboriginal painter, Albert Namatjira. Born in 1902, Albert Namatjira rose to star status through the acceptance of his art by white Australia in the 1950s. As a result, he was awarded Australian citizenship in 1958. What followed was an often tragic life, caught between white Australian and Aboriginal cultures.

Content notification

Our collection comprises over 40,000 moving image works, acquired and catalogued between the 1940s and early 2000s. As a result, some items may reflect outdated, offensive and possibly harmful views and opinions. ACMI is working to identify and redress such usages.

Learn more about our collection and our collection policy here. If you come across harmful content on our website that you would like to report, let us know.

How to watch

This work has not been digitised and is currently unavailable to view online. It may be possible for approved reseachers to view onsite at ACMI.

Learn more about accessing our collection

Collection

In ACMI's collection

Credits

director

John Tristram

co-producer

I. James Wilson

John Tristram

production company

Juniper Films

Duration

00:55:00:00

Production places

Australia

Production dates

1988

Collection metadata

ACMI Identifier

300254

Language

English

Subject categories

Crafts & Visual Arts → Aboriginal Australian artists

Crafts & Visual Arts → Namatjira, Albert, 1902-1959

Documentary

Documentary → Documentary films - Australia

Economics, Philosophy, Politics, Religion & Sociology → Culture conflict

History → History

People → Namatjira, Albert, 1902-1959

Short films

Short films → Short films - Australia

Sound/audio

Sound

Colour

Holdings

VHS; Access Print (Section 1)

Please note: this archive is an ongoing body of work. Sometimes the credit information (director, year etc) isn’t available so these fields may be left blank; we are progressively filling these in with further research.

Cite this work on Wikipedia

If you would like to cite this item, please use the following template: {{cite web |url=https://acmi.net.au/works/79316--first-citizen-albert-namatjira-a/ |title=First citizen: Albert Namatjira |author=Australian Centre for the Moving Image |access-date=25 April 2024 |publisher=Australian Centre for the Moving Image}}

Australia, 1988

Please note