Lost Figures/Portraits of Patyegarang and William Dawes

This artwork uses a bevelled glass effect, which obscures the historical figures as abstract, forgotten or distant, while telling the elusive story of Patyegarang and William Dawes.

Patyegarang was a young Aboriginal woman living in the Sydney region when the British invaded in 1788. She played a significant role in early contact between Aboriginal and British people at Tar-Ra. She was a teacher to William Dawes, an engineer and astronomer. Together in 19790-91 they created what is now considered the first written account of the Sydney Aboriginal language.

Patyegarang's story only came to light when Dawes' language notebooks were revealed in London in 1972. Patyegarang is not mentioned in any of the other historical accounts of the First Fleet, so the little we know about her life is based on what can be understood, or inferred, from Dawes' notebooks.