In the early 1920s an adventurous school teacher approaching 50 years of age decided to stake a claim in an area of Central Australia. In a horse-drawn wagon, with a young family, 300 sheep, a small herd of goats, 13 horses and a few hens, he set off from Mungindi, NSW on a journey that was to take him several years.
This man was Charles Chalmers who was one of the first pioneers in central Australia. In 1923 he took up the lease of MacDonald Downs in the Utopia region and raised several thousand sheep over many years. From the very beginning his compassion and understanding of the traditional Aboriginal owners of this country was legendary. He protected them and they protected him.
He passed this compassion onto his four children Jean, Malcolm, Donald and Jessie who grew up among the Aboriginal people and were fluent in the Anmetyarre language.
Today, the third generation of Chalmers still live on MacDonald Downs with the children and grandchildren of the Aboriginal people who lived and worked with their grandfather. In a unique mutual arrangement, the traditional owners of Utopia (the Elders) and the Chalmers are working together again as part of Utopian Aboriginal Art and the Utopia Community Project.
Eastern Desert Art and the Utopian Aboriginal Art website was founded in 2006 and launched in January 2007 by Sonja and Charlie Chalmers to assist the Aboriginal land owners in employment, training and land management programs for the re-establishment of Utopia as a cattle station.
We look forward to continuing a strong and unique relationship with our artists and neighbours into the future and ask you to help support our initiative through investing in a piece of internationally recognised Utopian Aboriginal art.
An excerpt from the book about the Chalmers family - Beyond the Furthest Fences by Margaret Ford published in 1966.
‘Out frequently in the morning shepherding and frequently not in again until just on, or after dark, he (Charles Chalmers) was away from the scene of homestead life... It had been said of his critics that he was far more interested in the habits and beliefs of his aboriginal staff than that of his own children. The statement was not true but his daily programme would have encouraged such an opinion.
Chalmers himself acknowledged his affection for the native, his respect for his adaptation to the bush, and his mastery of even certain skills fondly imagined by the white man to be his own prerogative. He could understand the aboriginal's extensive knowledge of bird, animal and plant life since on these his existence directly depended. To know in detail the life history of the native bee, to know an edible from a poisonous berry, even to know to the day when a young galah would make its first attempt to fly, and so be an easy catch – these were the necessities for living. But the aboriginal's extraordinary ability in tracking and direction-finding were always a source of wonder to him.
The aboriginal's ability to track is exemplified in an incident when Mac the eldest of Chalmers son's set off in search of a lost neighbour, an account of which found its way to the Adelaide Advertiser....'He took two of his best trackers and began a search for a neighbour, then lost for a day and a night. Footprints crossing creeks and roads were clearly visible; over red soil plains less so. Where a maze of tracks crossed and recrossed, searchers chose the freshest and followed these. Over stony hills they walked slowly, seeking signs. A pitiless sun poured down. They carried no food thinking to be away only a short while, and the little water they had, they dared not drink. Late in the afternoon, clouds promised rain which would have obliterated all tracks. Then when they found fresh, clear footprints, they ran, and under the tree they found the perishing woman. Later the white man (Mac Chalmers) waved aside thanks and credit. I can see an overturned stone, but only an aborigine can tell if it is done by a human foot or a kangaroo, he said....
Five native shepherds squat in the dust near the river bank with wood on their shoulders...the old man has now made the tea, carries the billy, bread and meat to the shepherds. He still uses no stick...is only slightly stooped...green cardigan, drill trousers, tartan cap...always the school pen behind his ear. He gives them the food...turns...I see the slow kind smile...like a marvellous dream in his face...he walks quickly now...still determined...' So Chalmers remains in the land he understands, protected by those whom he has protected; an old man who passionately looks forward and not back, and is as vitally concerned about he tragedy of the world's hungry people, as the fact that the aboriginal has a wisdom in teaching his child, that the white man has forgotten at his peril. He is a man who makes no claim to greatness, but who has a touch of it, because he has courage and he is kind... If ever a man had been continually renewed in his soul by the bush it is Chalmers, and perhaps the bush alone understands him...’
(Photo: Jock Chalmers and Utopian Aboriginal Art artist Freddy Kngwarreye Jones, © Eastern Desert Art)
Sonja Chalmers
Eastern Desert Art ABN: 79 722 554 907
Tel: (08) 8956 9433 (Australia wide) or +618 8956 9433 (international)
Fax: (08) 8956 9177 (Australia wide) or +618 8956 9177 (international)
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