What Artists See

A luminous collection of essays on art, obsession and creativity from one of Australia’s best critics

Why do we revere the figure of the artist? Is the drive to create an innate human instinct or a form of compulsion? Is the provocateur more lauded than the realist? Why do artists do what they do, day after day, in a display of discipline and will?

The twelve essays in this collection offer glimpses into the lives of some of Australia’s best contemporary artists, exploring the impetus for creativity and the role of art in making meaning. Tied together by an enduring curiosity for how artists practice – what motivates them, what confounds them and what compels them to keep creating – these pieces span the islands of Carpentaria to suburban Perth, the streets of Malaysia to the deserts of the Northern Territory. What emerges is art as an act of wilful vision – of alternative ways of seeing that illuminate the otherwise invisible.

Praise for The Stranger Artist

‘A landmark in Australian literature – a book written in gouache, acrylic, blood and tears: the story of the modern frontier, where high art, for a brief, magic time, was made from the trust and tension between two worlds.’ – Nicolas Rothwell, author of Quicksilver, Belomor and Red Heaven

‘Utterly compelling. Vivid and unflinching. Beautifully written. An exceptional and intimate portrait of artistic collaboration informed by a deep knowledge of place, people and culture, this is a story of how Indigenous art emerges in the Kimberley, inseparable from the Country itself, and the embers of history. The Stranger Artist captures the texture of everyday life in the Kimberley in a way no book has done before.’– Mark McKenna, author of Return to Uluru and Looking for Blackfella’s Point

‘Quentin Sprague has written a grand cross-cultural tale of genius, co-dependency, brotherhood, mythmaking and hubris.’ – Kim Mahood, author of Wandering With Intent and Position Doubtful

‘Like many a fine work of art, The Stranger Artist attracts with a brilliant surface while fascinating with its deeper layers … it is full of intense colour and eccentricity, while also permeated with great sadness.’ – Luke Stegemann, The Australian Book Review

‘The absorbing origin story of a painting movement like no other. Quentin Sprague draws us into a world of heat, busted LandCruisers and community decay with a lyrical portrait of tragic hope where art and cultural exchange come to life.’ – Ashleigh Wilson, author of Brett Whiteley: Art, Life and the Other Thing and On Artists

‘A gripping tale of hubris, the consequences of historic violence on an entire region, and glimpses of the redemptive possibilities of creative expression.’ – John Kean, Artlink

‘Sprague’s hauntingly beautiful descriptions of country, his deep understanding of two cultures in collision, and his sumptuous descriptions of the act of painting, mark this work as a literary gem.’ – Judges’ comments, 2021 Prime Minister’s Literary Award

‘… lucid, moving, and bears the mark of first-hand experience. This book is destined to become an invaluable accounting of a ground-breaking art group that was also an audacious political gesture.’ – Robyn Ferrell, The Canberra Times