Dear Inspector Smart,
I accept your request in helping you get the safe return of the art work titled "Self-Portrait" by Julie Dowling. I have attached important information regarding details on the portrait to help you in your case of returning it.
Now Inspector, I want to paint my own picture in your mind on what the painting really looks like. Firstly the painting was completed in 2002 and is a synthetic polymer paint, oil and red ochre on a 120 x 100cm canvas.
The artist's painting is both historical and modern in the way Julie Dowling brings her Australian Aboriginal heritage and modern Australia together. Julie does this by painting her self in the center of the painting with how she is in today's Australia and then in side her, she drew a painting of her ancestors from the time of the dreaming.
Inspector, the image in your mind may still be foggy but do not worry I have included much more information. You may not see it yet, but this painting has a huge degree of symbolism and is very representational in the way Julie painted her ancestors before the white invasion, full of freedom, happiness and crowed by family and friends, and then you see Julie herself alone with a barren landscape behind her. All though she painted the same desert landscape behind her in her today's portrait and her ancestors one, she's trying to make the point that it's not the land that has changed it is the people.
In the presentation of her work, Julie painted the art work in portrait mode not landscape, for a traditional affect.
Inspector Smart, as you may know most artists use there art to explain what they are thinking or how they are feeling, and in Julie's case that's exactly what she did. The reason Julie painted the image of her family inside of her was to represent that she has not forgotten what used to be and that, which will always remain in her heart.
Inspector Smart, here is just a brief outline of the basic looks; in the...