Richard Rosebery
/
Haast Bluff, 2018, Western MacDonnell Ranges, Northern Territory, acrylic on canvas, 21.5 x 25.5 cm.
Haast Bluff is 230 kms west of Alice Springs. Ernest Giles (1835-1897), the first white visitor to the area, named this spectacular metamorphic rock formation in 1872 after the distinguished German-born New Zealand geologist Sir Johann Franz “Julius” von Haast (1824-1887). Giles described the Bluff as a "towering sentinel of the MacDonnells west of the Derwent Creek". The Aranda people know the locality as Anjili and it is a site of considerable significance in Aboriginal lore. It's a subject often painted by Albert Namatjira.