Name/TitleAborigines in Landscape
About this objectPierre Antoine Marchais was an artist on the 1817 French expedition aboard the ship URANIE, led by Louis Claude de Saulces de Freycinet. Accompanying the artists Jacques Arago and J Alphone Pellion, Marchais’ primary role was to prepare the expedition drawings for later engraving. This watercolour is a rare representation of Australian aborigines drawn from the firsthand experience of early European visitors to Australia.
Louis de Freycinet had previously sailed in the 1800-1803 Baudin expedition to explore the south and south-west coasts of Australia in the NATURALISTE and GEOGRAPHE, following which Freycinet published the first map to show a full outline of the coastline of Australia. In 1817, he commanded the URANIE, in which the marine hydrologist Louis Isidore Duperrey and seventeen other officers and scientists sailed to Ro do Janeiro to undertaken scientific research in geography, ethnology, astronomy, magnetism, meteorology, and the collection of natural history specimens. The expedition spent three years in the Pacific, visiting Australia, the Mariana Islands, Hawaii and other Pacific Islands and South America, and not withstanding the loss of the URANIE in the Falkland Islands during the return voyage, returned to France with substantial collections of natural history and with voluminous notes and drawings of the countries visited. The results of this voyage were published under Freycinet’s supervision, with the title of Voyage autour du monde fait par ordre du Roisur les corvettes de S.M. l’URANIE et al Physicienne, pendant les années 1817, 1818, 1819 et 1820.
MakerPierre Antoine Marchais - Artist
Maker RoleArtist
Date Madec1817-1820
Period19th century
Medium and MaterialsWatercolour, paper and ink
Place MadeParis, France
Place MadeAustralia
Measurements190mm x 265mm
Object TypeIndigenous History
Object numberSF001740
Copyright Licence
Attribution - Non-commercial - No Derivatives (cc)
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The mug is decorated with an underglaze and a blue transfer print. On the body, it is titled ‘Emigrants to Australia’. This type of body and glaze was discontinued by 1840. Comparison of the handle shape and the profile of the foot, point to the attribution of manufacture by the Davenport Factory.
Delta was a ship-rigged vessel with two decks and three masts. It was built in Dordrecht, Netherlands in 1839 at the shipyard of Jan Schouten and registered in the same port. Its hull was constructed of oak and sheathed in ‘yellow metal’. Delta was owned by H. van der Sande at the time of its loss and was engaged as a cargo trader.
The Delta carried 29 crew and passengers, while sailing from Melbourne to Batavia in ballast when wrecked at Kenn Reefs on 30 May 1854 whilst under the command of Captain J.G. Kunst. This vessel loss supports the pattern of shipwrecks located on a well-travelled shipping route that was poorly charted until the mid-nineteenth century. The crew of the Delta could see four other shipwrecks at Kenn Reefs at the time of their vessel’s loss.
Important image of a ship associated with Matthew Flinders, that would shortly become one of the most famous early shipwrecks in eastern Australian waters. This is a fine ship’s portrait, by one of the great exponents of the art