{"meta":{"version":"2.1","_links":{"self":{"href":"https://api.vam.ac.uk/v2/object/O546191"},"collection_page":{"href":"https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O546191/"}},"images":{"_primary_thumbnail":"https://framemark.vam.ac.uk/collections/2008BT9184/full/!100,100/0/default.jpg","_iiif_image":"https://framemark.vam.ac.uk/collections/2008BT9184/","_alt_iiif_image":[],"imageResolution":"low","_images_meta":[{"assetRef":"2008BT9184","copyright":"© Victoria and Albert Museum, London","sensitiveImage":false}]},"see_also":null},"record":{"systemNumber":"O546191","accessionNumber":"E.990-1983","objectType":"Print","titles":[{"title":"Sacrificial Dance","type":"assigned by artist"}],"summaryDescription":"John Graham was an Irish man sentenced in 1825 for theft. His punishment was seven years in an Australian penal colony. He quickly escaped and lived for several years with Aboriginal people in Duungidjawu country near what is now the city of Brisbane. In 1836, he assisted with a rescue party to K'gari (also known as Gari, or Great Sandy Island) where the survivors of a wrecked Scottish brig, the Stirling Castle, had been taken ashore by indigenous islanders. Eliza Fraser was one of the survivors and her later sensationalised interviews were so widely published that the island has been most commonly known as Fraser Island ever since. Her telling of the story became ever more exaggerated and lurid upon her return to the UK, full of cannibalism and reports of 'horrible barbarity' which fuelled the making of print interpretations such as this. She was later discredited entirely by other eyewitnesses who reported that the Butchulla people of K'gari had saved the lives of the shipwrecked people and ensured their health and safety for several weeks until they could be transported home.","physicalDescription":"Print of a group of naked Aboriginal women, depicted with simplified faces, dancing around a naked white woman whose features are obscured by her hair.","artistMakerPerson":[{"name":{"text":"Robert Gibbings","id":"A2866"},"association":{"text":"artist","id":"AAT25103"},"note":""}],"artistMakerOrganisations":[{"name":{"text":"Faber & Faber","id":"AUTH326244"},"association":{"text":"publishers","id":"AAT25574"},"note":""}],"artistMakerPeople":[],"materials":[{"text":"paper","id":"AAT14109"}],"techniques":[{"text":"wood engraving","id":"AAT53303"}],"materialsAndTechniques":"","categories":[{"text":"Prints","id":"THES48903"},{"text":"Colonialism and Empire","id":"THES253004"},{"text":"Propaganda","id":"THES48902"}],"styles":[],"collectionCode":{"text":"PDP","id":"THES48595"},"images":["2008BT9184"],"imageResolution":"low","galleryLocations":[{"current":{"text":"LVLC (VA)","id":"THES49171"},"free":"","case":"EW","shelf":"144","box":"A"}],"partTypes":[[{"text":"print","id":""}]],"contentWarnings":[{"apprise":"Yes-general","note":"Racial stereotype"}],"placesOfOrigin":[{"place":{"text":"Britain","id":"x32019"},"association":{"text":"printed","id":"x46159"},"note":""}],"productionDates":[{"date":{"text":"1937","earliest":"1937-01-01","latest":"1937-12-31"},"association":{"text":"made","id":"x28654"},"note":""}],"associatedObjects":[],"creditLine":"Given by Patience Empson","dimensions":[],"dimensionsNote":"","marksAndInscriptions":[],"objectHistory":"","historicalContext":"","briefDescription":"Wood engraving to illustrate 'John Graham, Convict' by Robert Gibbings, 1937.","bibliographicReferences":[{"reference":{"text":"","id":""},"details":"","free":"The following excerpts are from 'In the wake of first contact' by Kay Schaffer, Cambridge University Press, 1995. The book attempts to unpick much of the myth, complexity, and colonial history surrounding the Stirling Castle shipwreck and Eliza Fraser, depicted in this print as the naked white woman in the centre of the circle:\r\n\n'Although John Graham is the rescuer of record, he may have been assisted by another escaped convict, David Bracefell, the rescuer of legend...after the penal colony had been disbanded, he [Bracefell] alleged that he had rescued ‘the lady’ [Eliza Fraser], and walked her back to Moreton Bay. But, complaining of his treatment, she had betrayed him at the edge of civilisation, breaking her promise to intercede on his behalf for a pardon. The official report, however, names Graham alone, who is said to have claimed Eliza from the ‘hostile natives’ by representing her as the ghost of his dead wife. She had spent fifty-two days in their company...\n\nThe centrality of Bracefell’s place in the narrative would be displaced in 1937 with the publication of a book by Robert Gibbings, <u>John Graham, Convic</u><u>t, 1824</u>. The historical biography, written to commemorate the sesquicentenary of Australia, tells of Graham’s heroic past, his impoverished background in Ireland, his transportation to New South Wales for a petty felony of stealing six pounds of hemp to support his widowed mother, and the harshness of the British penal system on the Irish.'\n"}],"production":"","productionType":{"text":"","id":""},"contentDescription":"","contentPlaces":[],"associatedPlaces":[{"text":"Australia","id":"x30016"}],"contentPerson":[],"associatedPerson":[],"contentOrganisations":[],"associatedOrganisations":[],"contentPeople":[],"associatedPeople":[],"contentEvents":[],"associatedEvents":[],"contentOthers":[{"text":"caricature","id":"AAT15634"},{"text":"racism","id":"AAT55304"}],"contentConcepts":[],"contentLiteraryRefs":[],"galleryLabels":[],"partNumbers":["E.990-1983"],"accessionNumberNum":"990","accessionNumberPrefix":"E","accessionYear":1983,"otherNumbers":[],"copyNumber":"","aspects":["WHOLE"],"assets":[],"recordModificationDate":"2025-05-02","recordCreationDate":"2009-06-30","availableToBook":false}}