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Women to Remember
NOTE: This is an archive of our 2002 website. For current information, please see our updated site for 2003.
Pink, Olive
Muriel (1884 - 1975) Olive Pink was a botanical artist and anthropologist who campaigned for the rights of Aboriginal people. She was one of few women anthropologists working in a male dominated field in the 1930s and 1940s. Pink positioned herself as an expert on Aboriginal people and campaigned from this basis in her criticism of government officials, missionaries and pastoralists. Career Highlights Born Hobart, Tasmania, 17 March 1884. Died Alice Springs, Northern Territory, 1975. Educated in art at Hobart Technical College. Pink worked at the Public Works Department and later the Railways Commission of New South Wales. She studied anthropology at Sydney University with the Workers' Educational Association and became secretary to the Anthropological Society of NSW. In 1926 & 1927 Pink travelled to Ooldea on the Transcontinental Line, SA. There, She created many of her early drawings of desert flora. Pink spent much time in the Northern Territory, living first with Arrernte and Warlpiri people and settling eventually in Alice Springs. She was a prolific correspondent, writing many letters to government departments and the press, particularly to represent her beliefs about Aboriginal people and her views on their better treatment by the government. Historian Julie Marcus suggests that Pink eventually lost faith in the potential of Anthropology to assist Aboriginal people, and abandoned the discipline later in life. In 1955 she applied for the reservation of an area of land on the eastern bank of the Todd River as a flora reserve. In 1956 the Australian Arid Regions Flora Reserve of 20 hectares was gazetted. Pink and her gardener Johnny Jambijimba Yannarilyi developed the garden, where Pink lived until her death. The garden was then renamed the Olive Pink Flora Reserve, and now contains over 300 of Central Australia's plant species. Related Entries for Pink, Olive Muriel Olive Pink Botanic
Garden, formerly Australian Arid Regions Native Flora Reserve and The
Olive Pink Flora Reserve (1956 -) Online Sources Women Tasmania, Significant Tasmanian Women: Olive Pink (1884-1975), Early Anthropologist, Aboriginal Rights Activist and Botanical Artist, 2001, http://www.women.tas.gov.au/significantwomen/search/olivepink.html. See Also National Library of Australia, Papers of E.W.P. (Ernest William Pearson) Chinnery (1887-1972), National Library of Australia, http://www.nla.gov.au/ms/findaids/0766.html. South Australian
Museum, 'Guide to the Norman B. Tindale Archives:' in Series 338/4 - Copies
of Journals, South Australian Museum, 2000, -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Published by
National Foundation for Australian Women on Australian Women's Archives
Project Web Site, -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright
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