From gum trees to cities to sweeping deserts: how 125 years of the Wynne Prize traces Australia's shifting relationship to our landscape

Elioth Gruner (1882–1939), Spring Frost, 1919. Oil on canvas Art Gallery of New South Wales

It is fair to say that Richard Wynne, who died in 1895, would not recognise many recent entries in the art prize that he endowed with £1,000 to reward a “landscape painting of Australian scenery”.

Since 1999, when Gloria Tamerre Petyarre was awarded the Wynne Prize for her magical sequence of Leaves, the Wynne has been dominated by works by Indigenous artists living in communities in central and northern Australia.