Vincent
Serico: Some people are stories
The paintings of Vincent Serico come out of two deep wells–
the history of Aboriginal people and their aspirations to live
their daily lives as honest free people, and the history of
the Australian nation, it’s origins, legacy, and responsibility.
If a ‘black armband’ view of history can be claimed,
so can a ’white blindfold’ view, together in co-existence.
No-where is this more evident than in the state of Queensland.
It was no accident that, after a first book dealing with the
history of contact in Tasmania, historian Henry Reynold’s
second dealt with the same subject in Queensland. Further back,
in 1968, W. E. H. Stanner spoke of the ‘great Australian
silence’ about the ‘river of blood’ running
through Aboriginal and colonial history. These are the rivers
of Vincent Serico.
The rivers that brought us life also brought death in the cavalcade
of colonial explorers, squatters, troopers, native police and
government officials who followed them to claim, conquer and
massacre. The consequent re-drawing of physical and social borders
brought the ‘shadow’ reverse side to every official
history embodied in the official, ‘white blindfold’
view of history -- the vexed obsession of our current Prime
Minister.
The artist’s art is to acknowledge Aboriginal existence
in a way that gives comfort, while recognising past pain, sorrow,
longing and loss, and leaving a trace of them in the hearts
of others. The artist’s central attribute is to make the
art ‘sing’ in a positive winning stroke, rather
than creating a resigned memorial.
Vincent’s capturing of ‘the catastrophic event’
of contact follows a tradition of translating oral history into
visible images by artists such as William Barak [1828-1903],
Tommy McCrae [1836-1901] and Mickey of Ulladulla [1820-1891].
More recently Robert Campbell Jnr, Milton Budge, and Lin Onus
have been equally important, illustrative and appropriately
political. What could be called a naive or multi-perspectival
style in their and Vincent’s work in fact creates a floating
dreamlike collision of people, place and time where both sides
remain permanently scarred; one physically and the other morally.
(text by Djon Mundine -catalogue foreword some people are stories
2007)
Beneath
the surface of Serico’s astonishing visual combinations
we see an artist willing to cross the divides of both time and
cultures, in order to extract hidden tales this country still
holds for us. Several of his compositions take on a Dick Roughsey
feel with gentle and sensitive treatments of the Queensland
bush amidst Aboriginal and colonial figures of the 19th and
20th centuries. Meanwhile in other works he employs distinctive
regional Aboriginal designs announcing his own accumulated ‘troubadour’
experiences - an essential pride in the peculiar indigenous
perspective of the land and life. Serico has never been afraid
to tell it like it is. There have been epic paintings lampooning
the behavior of Aborigines themselves, contemporary issues such
as the rorting of ATSIC government funds, the duplicity of politicians,
or the ambiguous roles historically played out by the black-trackers
with explorers and graziers in the colonisation process. Serico’s
paintings are based on oral histories from an Aboriginal perspective
that may not necessarily be the same as that which what white
history has recorded. Serico is always quick to acknowledge
his peculiar vision is gleaned from watching people - judging
both black and white folks from the same rule book. (Michael
Eather 2006)
