A carved hardwood portrait panel of an Indigenous Australian man by Robert Prenzel, signed, early 1920s, Bust-length, carved in very high relief, the bare-chested man in a laughing expression, stained dark brown, in its original fiddleback blackwood frame applied to the edges of the panel, incised signature lower right 'R. Prenzel Melbourne', 60 cm high, 47 cm wide, 4.5 cm deep. Other Notes: The origin, meaning, and variety of Prenzel's 1920s portraits of indigenous Australian men and women is discussed by Terence Lane in his Robert Prenzel, 1866-1941: his life and work (National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, 1994), pp 37-40.