The artworks were donated by a former gallery trustee, the late Darvell M Hutchinson, who was an avid collector of paintings by the movement of Aboriginal artists from central Australia.
His gift has transformed the gallery's holding of works from the Hermannsburg school into a great strength of its First Nations art and design collection, according to NGV director Tony Ellwood.
The paintings, which had been displayed on rotation in Hutchinson's home, have gone on public display for the first time as part of Watercolour Country: 100 works from Hermannsburg, which opens on Friday.
"We're really excited to be able to showcase them all in one go, it feels really special to be able to show the breadth of this school of art," curator Sophie Gerhard said.
"It's really rare to have so many side by side. They almost look like a stained-glass window they are so beautiful."
One of Australia's best-known artists, Albert Namatjira in the 1930s became the first Aboriginal artist to paint the land in Western-style watercolours.
Lenie Namatjira's Mt Gillen, near Alice Springs references Albert Namatjira's housing struggles.
It led to international fame, with the style of Namatjira and his fellow artists becoming known as the Hermannsburg School and their paintings displayed in galleries around the world.
Among the donated watercolours is Albert Namatjira's Haast Bluff, Central Australia, from the 1940s, showing the purple-blue peak rising in the distance above a landscape of grasslands and outcrops.
There are two more from the 1950s: the moody Central Australia, MacDonnell Ranges, and Finke River Gorge.Â
The exhibition is a showcase for the Hermannsburg style more broadly, with more than 40 Arrernte, Western Arrernte and Kemarre/Loritja artists on display, from Namatjira's contemporaries such as Otto Pareroultja to artists currently working at the Iltja Ntjarra (Many Hands) art centre in Alice Springs.
Related artists are displayed together, including the Inkamala, Pareroultja, and Raberaba families, and a close look reveals the intergenerational influences as well as distinctive individual styles.
"Our ancestors, from the Ntaria region, are very important for us because we carry their landscape painting legacy through our artworks," artist Vanessa Inkamala said.
A satirical painting by Benita Clements shows Aboriginal people hunting near a Golden Arches sign.
More contemporary works are at times explicitly political, with Benita Clements' 2016 satirical painting titled West McDonalds Ranges shows Aboriginal people hunting for food near a Golden Arches sign.
From Lenie Namatjira there's Mt Gillen, near Alice Springs, a Western Desert landscape overlaid with the words "20 YEAR WAITING LIST".
A note on the back of the painting references Albert Namatjira's struggles with housing: he was refused a grazing licence in 1950 and the following year he was blocked from building a house on land he owned at Alice Springs.
It's possible to directly hear the voices of some of the Hermannsburg artists' descendants, with three current artists travelling from Alice Springs to Melbourne, and QR codes on artwork labels linking to audio talking about the paintings.
The last room displays a collaboration by 11 contemporary artists from Iltja Ntarra, a group hanging silk panels painted in watercolour, with images of country and stories from the artists' childhoods titled Woven in time 2022.
Watercolour Country: 100 works from Hermannsburg opens on Friday at The Ian Potter Centre: NGV Australia at Fed Square, Melbourne.
11°C