The best of the barks headed to six figure levels like Alec's Mngelmananu's Wanjina (which made A$102,000 at Sotheby's in 2007) but the record for the dots and post dots acrylics on canvas headed to a ready $1 million plus.
At the auction of the Evatt collection of bark paintings and sculpture by Bonhams Australia at the Byron Kennedy Hall in Sydney on November 24, however, one of Mr Evatt's horses finally came home.
The auction of barks and carved sculptures grossed $929,944 IBP against estimates of $494,900 to $753,400.
Only 15 of the 319 lots offered failed to find buyers under the hammer making for a 98 per cent clearance by volume and 98 per cent by value.
While the dots have been through enormous vicissitudes, barks' more measured gains were at the end of the day, beginning to look far more tangible.
Even in terms of the less spectacular tobacco standard, which was the commodity against which the artists had measured them in earlier days, barks have continued to fire away.
(The joker Spike Milligan made some acerbic comments about how good barks were sold, way back in 1962 and not long before to Mr Evatt's bid to put them in a professional commercial gallery setting, for a packet of Woodbines or a bandana.)
There were no spectacular barks from the more contemporary period in the Evatt collection that fetch big prices based on their "sophistication" and refinement but many of the names who emerged in the classic period were well represented.
A crowd of around 150 of almost all the significant players in the barks market turned out for the dispersal, some reserving their chairs with their bags and cardigans well before the sale. The crowd stayed for more than four hours of sustained and mostly discriminate, well paced bidding.
The collection was selectively sought with the quality lots at a premium and the chaff examined judiciously as that of an eminent member of the legal fraternity should be,
Mr Evatt also successfully gambled that a large offering with conservative estimates would bring out the bargain hunters.
Backed by a family name associated with serious collecting (the related politico H.V.Evatt was a major collector of overseas art) and with one owner collections doing 10 times as well as mixed vendor collections in all fields this bet also paid off.
Bringing out many of the old collectors not seen at sales or on the gallery pitch for years, the sale showed barks firmly in such unlikely categories as collectibles like Dinky Toys and Hornby trains, which Mr Evatt has also collected, in attracting a passionate commitment.
The estimates were inviting which was wise given bark and carved sculpture sales of 300+ lots can be a hard ask for the market due to the medium's limited colour range.
When Mr Evatt formed Gallery of Dreams in a difficult to park corner-conjunction-of-lanes in Paddington only two Aboriginal artists loomed seriously in the public consciousness, Albert Namatjira and Yirawala.
Like Milligan, Evatt was considered a bit if a joker when he forecast one man shows would become commonplace for Aboriginal artists as they were for non-indigenous artists
Yirawalas have since been hard to buy however, as the artist's agent Ms Sandra Holmes placed so many with public collections.
On Sunday most buyers knew who they were buying, and why, and mostly what the stories were that the artists were sharing.
Yirawala, enjoying a reputation based on the endorsement of Picasso, was thinly represented by two good and one ordinary example of his work.
Mr John Cruthers, who was largely responsible for putting the Grundy collection of Australian art together, fiercely underbid the two works, but both appeared to go bidders not in the room for many times the estimates. Yirawala's Crocodile (Golomomo) (Lot 73 ) estimated at $5000 to $7000 sold for $34,100 IBP while his Gray Rock Wallaby (Mardayin Ceremony) (Lot 72 ) made $19,520 against $5000 to $7000) .
The ordinary Barramundi - Mardayin Ceremony (Lot 123 ) ($1000 to $1500) made $4880.
Artists with a distant link to the elders of rock art such as Lofty Bardayal Nadjamerrek were keenly sought, the sale opening with a very fine specimen featuring a reference to the X-ray technique. Ngalyod – the Rainbow Serpent (Lot 1 ) estimated at $7000 to $10,000 sold for $28,060 to Bonhams consultant Mr Tim Klingender with a client on the phone. The bark was similar to certain of the best Loftys in public institutions.
Later Lofty's Lightning Spirit (Namarrkon) (Lot 101 ) sold for $47,580 (estimate $7000 to $10,000) despite the havoc his electric storms had been creating around Sydney in the preceding days.
The same artist's Mimih Spirits Dancing (Lot 138 ) sold for $36,600 against $8000 to $12,000 to Mr Klingender versus Mr Cruthers.
Crossover collectors from non-Indigenous art might well have considered this work, the catalogue cover picture, lot 138 as a buy rather that the prints and paintings from members of the Claude Flight deco school in a parallel Bonhams Australia sale with its similar rings of figures in animated action.
Peter Marralwanga who died in 1987 was rewarded for his innovation when four lots went for $29,280 (Lot 53 ), $10,980 (Lot 55 ) $10,370 (Lot 52 ) and $7015 (Lot 54 ). Some speculation may have attached to him as to others as to their inclusion in an exhibition which opens early in December at the National Museum of Australia. The museum's exhibition Masterpieces, shows the treasures of the collection which the museum has been quietly buying in earnest for more than a decade.
While Lightning Spirits stole some of the show, kangaroos and mimih spirits maintained their popularity especially when the two were combined as in Two Kangaroos and Mimih Hunter by Dick Murrumurru (Lot 118 ) which sold for $20,740, the hammer of $17,000 being comfortably above the $8000 to $12,000 estimate.
Mick Kubarkku's vertical depictions of ancestor and Mimi figures also starred with Mr Cruther's finally succeeding with the purchase of Ancestors of the Purukupali Myth (lot 104) for $7320 against an estimate of $3000 to $5000. Kubarkkku's Mimih Spirits with Spears (lot 105), however, went to ubiquitous bidder number 327 for $9760, estimate $7000 to $10,000.
One could not suppress a smile on seeing Wally Mandarrk's Female Mimih with Dilly Bag, (Lot 62 ) yet this still made over estimate at $3904 but Mr Evatt did not call his gallery Hogarth for nothing.
Sculptures fared well in line with the new appreciation for the three dimensional, brought on by Sculpture by The Sea. At up to $14,640 each for the Pukamani poles, however, it is doubtful that these wooden carvings will be placed around swimming pools, which is also a driver for the solid new market in big sculptures in Sydney. The lightning spirits would get them if the rain did not.
