Year Of Birth

1948

Year Of Death

1996

Biography

Lin Onus, also known by his Yorta Yorta name Burrinja, was one of the most significant and original Australian artists of the late twentieth century. Working across painting, sculpture and installation, Onus developed a highly distinctive visual language that fused photorealistic depictions of landscape and water with Indigenous iconography, storytelling and humour. His practice consistently unsettled conventional distinctions between Indigenous and non-Indigenous artistic traditions, creating layered works that operate simultaneously as cultural narrative, political commentary and formal experiment. A self-taught artist and the son of Yorta Yorta activist Bill Onus, his work was deeply informed by a lifetime of engagement with Indigenous rights, cultural identity and the experience of moving between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal worlds. A pivotal visit to Arnhem Land in the 1980s further expanded his practice, leading to exchanges with senior artists and the incorporation of rarrk-based imagery into his work. Works such as Fruit Bats (1991) exemplify his characteristic blend of wit, inversion and cultural complexity, in which suburban Australia becomes a site of quiet disruption and visual storytelling. Today, Onus is recognised as a central figure in contemporary Australian art, with works held in all major national collections and an enduring legacy as an artist who fundamentally reshaped the language of Indigenous and Australian visual culture.