Indigenous Tasmanian woman, Arra-Maida, 1802

• This asset is a product of the 1800-04 French expedition to Australia led by Nicolas Baudin (1754-1803) - the expedition set out aboard two ships in October 1800, the largest scientific team up to that time to leave Europe for the Pacific; Britain and France had been at war since 1793 and although British authorities were suspicious of French territorial intentions in Australia they guaranteed safe passage for the expedition, which contributed greatly to knowledge in Europe about Australia's Indigenous peoples, geography, and flora and fauna.
• It provides evidence that the Baudin expedition focused on details of Indigenous individuals - the 'Age of Discovery' by European explorers sparked great interest in theories of human development and the original inhabitants of Australia and the South Pacific islands; several expeditioners, including Baudin, were members of the newly formed Société des Observateurs d'Homme (Society of the Observers of Man), and zoologist François Péron (1775-1810) represented the new science of social anthropology.
• It is an example of the work of the artist Nicolas-Martin Petit (1777-1804), who had trained in the school of the leading French neo-classical painter Louis David (1748-1825) - Petit and Charles-Alexandre Lesueur (1778-1846) had both been hired as assistant gunners, but became the two official artists on the Baudin expedition; Petit's drawings of people he encountered in Van Diemen's Land comprise the earliest extensive depictions of Indigenous Tasmanians.
• It shows Arra-Maida, an apparent leader of a group of Bruny Island women who had been gathering crayfish and shellfish - François Péron believed Petit's drawing of Arra-Maida was 'a very correct resemblance' of her, showing the 'expression of courage and superiority which so greatly distinguished her from her companions'; Péron recorded that Arra-Maida had sung 'in a very pleasant and truly original manner' before dancing and making other movements, 'which might be thought very indecent' in 'civilised' society.
• It is an example of a portrait drawn under difficult and potentially dangerous circumstances, with both sides being totally ignorant of the other's language or cultural sensitivities - on one occasion, one of the expeditioners was speared, and in another incident, an Indigenous man unsuccessfully tried to snatch a drawing Petit had done of him.
• It depicts an Indigenous Bruny Island woman with traditional clothing and hairstyle - members of the Baudin expedition recorded that, unlike Arra-Maida, most of the Indigenous Tasmanians they saw, female and male, were completely naked and many greased their hair with fat mixed with ground charcoal or a type of red ochre.
• It is an example of a print made from an image engraved into metal - this print was made in Paris in 1807 using a stipple engraving by Barthelemy Roger (1767-1841), and was produced for one of the illustrations in the first edition of the atlas of the published account of the Baudin expedition, 'Voyage de decouvertes aux Terres Australes' (published in 1807); the original watercolour drawing of Arra-Maida by Petit (gouache and ink on blue paper) was the mirror image of the print, so it was actually the left side of her face that was drawn, not the right, as it appears in the print.

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