Dreamtime heritage: Australian aboriginal myths in paintings (The Dreamtime series)

Dreamtime heritage: Australian aboriginal myths in paintings (The Dreamtime series) by Roberts, Ainslie. hardcover edition. ISBN: 9781875168033.

In 1965, the collaboration of Charles P. Mountford, the ethnologist, and Ainslie Roberts, the artist, produced the extremely successful book THE DREAMTIME. That work was inspired by discussions over many years between Mountford and Roberts, in which the ethnologist narrated the Aboriginal myths collected during his research expeditions to Central and Northern Australia. This territory is well-known to Roberts, who had made many painting trips there, and as he listened to the myths he began to see them in terms of colour and design. The result was a series of paintings which were widely hailed for the sensitive imagery with which they captured the fantasies of the Aboriginal myths, and it was decided to incorporate them in a book. Mr. Mountford wrote a text which explains the background to the myths and Mr. Roberts added further illustrations in black and white. Public response was so great that Roberts was encouraged to paint three more series of pictures on the same theme all of which have been incorporated into books. DREAMTIME HERITAGE is one of these. The text was written by his wife, Melva Jean Roberts.