Summary

Caroline and Albert Le Souëf created three sets of decorated boxes containing miniature weapons. Caroline executed the detailed and delicate ink drawings on the outside of three boxes while her husband Albert made the miniature weapons. The scenes were of an imagined life of Taungurong people on the threshold of European contact. Albert was the son of William Le Souëf, who had been an Assistant Protector of Aborigines in this area in 1843, while Caroline was the daughter of English squatters who arrived in the area around the same time. As children, they had close contact with Taungurung people during the earliest period of aggressive pastoral expansion in the region between the 1830s and 1850s. The imagery and the miniatures reflect the pair's childhood experiences and lifelong interest in Aboriginal people.

Physical Description

A varnished wooden lidded box decorated with pictorial scenes drawn in ink on the sides and lid. Paper adhered to the inside of lid records the model object numbers and their descriptions.

Significance

This Le Souëf box was exhibited at the 1866 Melbourne Intercolonial Exhibition.

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