Exhibition: ‘Noir & Blanc: une esthétique de la photographie’ at the Bibliothèque nationale de France (BnF), François-Mitterrand, Paris

Exhibition dates: 17th October 2023 – 21st January 2024

Benjamin Brecknell Turner (English, 1815-1894)
North Side of Quadrangle, Arundel Castle
1852-1854
Negative photograph on paper
29.7 x 39.6cm
BnF, department of Prints and Photography, RES PHOTO EI-6-BOITE FOL B (n° 3)
Gift of André and Marie-Thérèse Jammes, 1960

What a lovely exhibition to start the year 2024 on Art Blart.

My favourite photographs in the posting: three beautiful fashion photographs by Frères Séeberger; a stunning late Atget Parc de Sceaux, Duchess Alley (between 1925 and 1927, below) in which you can feel the crispness in the air of the early winter morning; and the glorious seascapes of Gustave Le Gray, probably the best (and most atmospheric) photographer of the sea in all time.

In this posting we observe how black and white photographs are never just black and white but full of different hues and colours. These colour variations tell us a lot about the perception of the image.

As the exhibition text notes: “The strength of the blacks and whites, the variations of hues influence our perception of the image: the more contrasted it is, the more readable it is for our eye saturated with absolute blacks and whites; the more nuanced it is, the more sensitive the distance of time becomes.”

As we enter a new year, another year further away from the origin of the light captured in these photographs, the sensitivity of early photographers and their ability to displace time continues to entrance the viewer.

Dr Marcus Bunyan

Many thankx to the Bibliothèque nationale de France (BnF) for allowing me to publish the photographs in the posting. Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.

Noir & Blanc: Une esthétique de la photographie

Black and white is inseparable from the history of photography: its developments, from the end of the 19th century to today, have revealed its plastic force. While the use of colour intensified from the 1970s, black and white reinvented itself as a means of assertive aesthetic expression emphasising graphics and material. Black and white photography remains less expensive and simpler, but its persistence to this day can be explained above all by the fact that it has come to embody the very essence of photography. It appears to carry a universal, timeless, even memorial dimension, where colour would be the sole translation of the contemporary world.

The National Library of France holds one of the richest photographic collections in the world with some six million prints, these are particularly representative of this abundant history of black and white photography.

Benjamin Brecknell Turner (English, 1815-1894)
Arbre le long d’une clotûre (Tree along a fence)
1852-1854
Negative photograph on paper
23.5 x 27.3cm
BnF, department of Prints and Photography, RES PHOTO EI-6-BOITE FOL B (n° 3)
Gift of André and Marie-Thérèse Jammes, 1960

Photography on paper, with its speed and precision, revolutionised image production in the mid-19th century. The prerequisite is the production of a negative then of the same size as the print. The first negatives are on paper. Reversing the values of blacks and whites, they offer an unknown vision of the world. These oppositions, inverted or not, are the basis of the aesthetics of photography.

One of the earliest British amateur photographers, Benjamin Brecknell Turner (1815-1894) was experimenting with photography barely ten years after the invention of the medium. He exhibited widely during his lifetime and is best known for his beautiful photographs of 19th-century England, picturesque ruins and rural scenes.

A founder member of the Photographic Society of London, Turner contributed to the rapid technical and aesthetic development of photography in the 1850s. Our collection includes a unique album compiled by Turner, ‘Photographic Views from Nature’, containing some of the earliest photographs made in and around the counties of Worcestershire, Surrey, Sussex, Kent and Yorkshire, alongside the radical modern architecture of the Crystal Palace in London’s Hyde Park.

Text from the V&A website

The origins of black and white

Before the invention of colour photography by the Lumière brothers in 1903, one might believe that all photography was black and white. The reality is more complex: the early days were more those of a varied range of values where pure blacks and whites were the exception and so-called sepia tones were the most common. The negative / positive process patented by the Englishman Fox Talbot in 1841 makes it possible to multiply the prints on paper and therefore to vary the shades.

Certain subjects play on oppositions: the mountain views of the Bisson brothers, the Great Wave by Gustave Le Gray, the portraits of the prolific amateur Blancard.

Désiré Charnay (French, 1828-1915)
Chichen Itza: Bas-relief des Tigres, Palais du Cirque (Chichen Itza: Bas-relief of the Tigers, Circus Palace)
1859-1861
Print on gold-toned albumen paper from a collodion glass negative
BnF, Department of Prints and Photography, RES PHOTO VZ-940-FT4

In 1861, Charnay gave Napoleon III a copy of the album American Ruins composed for the Emperor of expensive proofs on albumen paper toned with gold, in an exceptional format, the miraculous result of his Mexican epic. The shift to gold accentuates the vigour of the contrasts and brings a cold tone to the blacks.

Désiré Charnay (French, 1828-1915)
Uxmal: détail de la façade dite de la couleuvre (Uxmal: detail of the so-called snake facade)
1859-1861
From the album American Ruins
Print on gold-toned albumen paper from a collodion glass negative
59 x 78.2cm
BnF, Department of Prints and Photography, RES PHOTO VZ-940-FT4

The forty-nine views of the ruins of Yucatan, Chiapas, Tabasco and the province of Oaxaca constitute the first set of photographs entered into the collections of the Geographical Society, in 1861. During the general assembly of November 29 , Charnay presents his collection of photographs exhibited in the meeting room. The same day, at the Academy of Inscriptions and Belles Lettres, Jomard returns to the quality of Charnay’s photographs, which allow us to conclude that American art – the Egyptologist’s supreme tribute – “deserves a place alongside Assyrian art, and even alongside the art of the Egyptians.”

Bisson frères. Louis-Auguste (French, 1814-1876) and Auguste-Rosalie (French, 1826-1900)
La crevasse (départ) sur le chemin du grand plateau, ascension du Mont-Blanc (The crevasse (departure) on the way to the grand plateau, ascent of Mont-Blanc)
1862
Print on albumen paper from a wet collodion glass negative
BnF, Department of Prints and Photography, EO-14 (3)-FOL

In 1861, the Bisson brothers managed to hoist their photographic equipment to the summit of Mont Blanc. Mountaineering feat, photographic feat: in these extreme conditions, the plate must be sensitised just before use and developed as soon as possible. The violence of the contrasts, when the brightness of the snow juxtaposes the black of the rocks, redoubles this technical challenge. This conquest of the limit is crowned by the harmony of the print, carried by a site with spectacular aesthetic qualities.

This exhibition brings together black and white masterpieces from the photographic collections of the National Library of France. Nadar, Man Ray, Ansel Adams, Willy Ronis, Helmut Newton, Diane Arbus, Mario Giacomelli, Robert Frank, William Klein, Daido Moriyama, Valérie Belin…: the big names in French and international photography are brought together in a journey which presents approximately 300 prints and embraces 150 years of history of black and white photography, from its origins in the 19th century to contemporary creation.

The exhibition in brief

The exhibition addresses the question of black and white from an aesthetic, formal and sensitive angle, emphasising the modes of image creation: plastic and graphic effects of contrasts, play of shadows and lights, rendering of materials in all the palette of values from black to white. The emphasis was placed on photographers who concentrated and systematised their artistic creation in black and white, experimented with its possibilities and limits or made it the very subject of their photography such as Man Ray, Ansel Adams, Ralph Gibson, Mario Giacomelli or Valérie Belin. Particular attention was paid to the quality of the prints, the variety of techniques and photographic papers, but also to the printing of black and white, books and magazines having long been the main relay to the public for photographic creation .

The exhibition thus shows the richness and extent of the BnF’s photographic collections. Among the richest in the world with some six million prints, these are particularly representative of this abundant history of black and white photography.

Exhibition co-organised with the Réunion des Musées Nationaux – Grand Palais

Commissariat

Sylvie Aubenas, director of the Prints and Photography department, BnF
Héloïse Conésa, head of the photography department, responsible for contemporary photography at the Department of Prints and Photography, BnF
Flora Triebel, curator in charge of 19th century photography at the Department of Prints and Photography, BnF
Dominique Versavel, curator in charge of modern photography at the Department of Prints and Photography, BnF

Text from the Bibliothèque nationale de France (BnF)

Hippolyte Blancard (French, 1843-1924)
Mademoiselle L. Vulliemin, à mi-corps, la tête couverte d’un chapeau (Miss L. Vulliemin, half-length, head covered with a hat)
1889
Platinum print from a gelatin-silver bromide glass negative
BnF, Department of Prints and Photography, EO-508-PET FOL
Gift of print dealer Maurice Rousseau, 1944

Amateur photographer, wealthy pharmacist enriched by the sale of digestive pills, Blancard creates a prolific and picturesque work in a superb contrast of black and white thanks to the use of platinum. This expensive process, patented in 1873, ensures stable prints with marked contrasts which do not stifle the rendering of halftones.

Émile Zola (French, 1840-1902)
Denise et Jacques, les enfants d’Émile Zola (Denise and Jacques, the children of Émile Zola)
1898 or 1899
Gelatin aristotype, gelatin aristotype on matte velvety paper with toning, cyanotype, silver print, gelatin aristotype toned with gold, collodion aristotype with toning
BnF, Department of Prints and Photography, NZ-214-8
Purchase at public sale, 2017

From 1894, the novelist devoted himself with passion to photography, in an intimate vein. Here he tests the effects of his shooting by varying the papers, the processes, the tones based on the same negative on a glass plate. We see that black and white is a monochromy among others (brown, orange, blue). Very few of these test prints created in the privacy of the photographer’s laboratory have reached us; the collection of these six prints is exceptional.

Frères Séeberger. Jules, Louis and Henri Séeberger (French, 1872-1932; 1874-1946; 1876-1956)
Untitled
1909-1912
Silver print on baryta paper
BnF, Department of Prints and Photography, OA-38 (1)-BOITE FOL
Acquisition-donation from the family, 1976

For almost half a century, the Séeberger brothers, specialising in fashion reporting, captured elegant women in their natural settings, racecourses, palaces, upscale beaches. The print on baryta paper, used here, marks a technical breakthrough. A layer of pure white barium sulfate is now interposed between the print support and the binder layer, where the image is formed. Manufactured industrially from the 1890s, chemically developed baryta papers and their characteristic cold tone would dominate silver production until the 1970s.

In Black and White

Entirely designed from the Library’s rich collections, Black & White: An aesthetic of photography presents more than 300 works from the 19th century to the present day which bear witness to the use black and white from more than 200 photographers from around the world.

Considering black and white photographic creation from the 19th century to the most contemporary works, the exhibition presented at the François-Mitterrand affirms an ambition commensurate with the historical and geographical scope of the BnF’s collections and their immense variety technical and stylistic. The Department of Prints and photography has been a high place of conservation and emulation for monochrome photographic expression, under the impetus in particular of Jean-Claude Lemagny. Recently deceased, this very first curator of photography contemporary, in office from 1968 to 1996, was a fervent defender of black and white aesthetics.

In the 19th century, the powerlessness of photography to reproduce colours do not reduce it only to black and white and the tonal variations (blue, sepia, etc.) are in fact multiple. The exhibition opens with a spectacular monochrome of prints by Émile Zola, alongside luxurious prints by Gustave Le Gray, by Désiré Charnay and the Bisson brothers. It is at the turn of the 20th century that black and white became the tonality of photography par excellence, with the generalisation of the gelatin-silver bromide process.

An artistic and aesthetic approach

The rest of the journey deliberately interweaves creations of the 20th and 21st centuries, without chronological consideration. According to a primarily artistic and aesthetic approach to black and white, works of authors, decades, styles, schools and various origins interact, in order to highlight visual constants and graphics observable in use by black and white by photographers from 37 countries. That the photographers either suffered lack of colour or – from the 1950s-1970s – preferred to it, black and white is appreciated by artists for its numerous graphic, material and symbolic, which allow them to obtain certain effects features.

Write in black and white

These are these different ways of writing in black and white that the exhibition shows, starting with the contrasts: prints by Imogen Cunningham and André Kertész at the sculptural portraits of black women by Valérie Belin, in passing through the photograms of Man Ray, the books of William Klein or the fashion photographs of Helmut Newton, the contrast is deliberately sought by certain artists. By accentuating blacks and whites, or even making them disappear to any intermediate shade of grey, they bring out the essential lines of their subjects, retrace the design of the world,
gain visual and graphic expressiveness.

The play of shadows and light, at the origins of the photographic act, forms another part of the exhibition highlights. Bringing together the works of photographers as varied as Brassaï, Alexandre Rodtchenko, Henri CartierBresson, Willy Ronis, Flor Garduño, Daido Moriyama, Arthur Tress or Ann Mandelbaum, this part emphasises the dazzling effects or shadows cast, explored by these artists in their portrait practice, of the street snapshot, of the nocturnal shooting or in their laboratory experiments.

The exhibition continues with a chart of tests deployed in ribbon, from the blackest to the whitest. These prints signed Jun Shiraoka, Emmanuel Sougez, Edward Weston, Barbara Crane or Israel Ariño recall the ability of black and white to render effects of matter by its infinite variations of grey or, conversely, suggest the overflow or disappearance of all matter.

A sensory experience

The journey ends with a paradox with the works of photographers who, like Patrick Tosani, Marina Gadonneix or Laurent Cammal, disturbing the visitor’s perception by using colour processes to represent a black and white subject – an ultimate game with codes inherited from their art. Designed to show the historical depth and the richness of the BnF collections, this exhibition is intended to be educational and sensitive: emphasising certain technical aspects linked to printing practices, while insisting also on the irreducible material part of this art. By the high quality of prints presented, the exhibition offers to the public a sensory experience that will make them perceive the nuances hidden behind this apparently monolithic notion black and white.

Flora Triebel and Dominique Versavel. “En Noir et Blanc,” in Une saison en photographie, Chroniques No. 98, BnF, September – December 2023

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Parc de Sceaux, Duchess Alley
Between 1925 and 1927
Print on matte albumen paper from gelatin-bromide glass negative
BnF, Department of Prints and Photography, EO-109 (16)-BOITE FOL B

Eugène Atget claimed a humble, artisanal practice of photography. He used the same old camera and printing paper for decades. Only the disappearance of his usual supplies forced him to change. There is therefore no aesthetic research, yet these colour variations tell us a lot about the perception of the image.

The photographer artist can choose the colours of his prints by playing on the chemistry of the fixing baths or on the nature of the papers.

Gold toning, known since the 1850s, produces deep blacks but is very expensive. Baryta or platinum papers appeared at the end of the century and made it possible to further accentuate contrasts.

Gustave Le Gray (French, 1820-1884)
Plage de Sainte-Adresse avec les bains Dumont (Sainte-Adresse beach with Dumont baths)
1856
Print on albumen paper from a collodion glass negative
31.3 x 41.3cm
Former Alfred Armand collection
BnF, Department of Prints and Photography, RESERVE FOL-EO-13 (3)

The strength of the blacks and whites, the variations of hues influence our perception of the image: the more contrasted it is, the more readable it is for our eye saturated with absolute blacks and whites; the more nuanced it is, the more sensitive the distance of time becomes.

Provenance

This article was designed as part of the exhibition “Black & White – An aesthetic of photography” presented at the BnF from October 17, 2023 to January 21, 2024.

The marines of Le Gray

Gustave Le Gray (1820-1884) is a central figure in 19th century photography. A contemporary of photographers like Nadar, Charles Nègre and Henri Le Secq, he began his career by training as a painter. With great mastery of photographic technique, he developed two major inventions, the collodion glass negative in 1850 and the dry wax paper negative in 1851.

Le Gray’s seascapes mark not only a milestone in the history of photography, but also its true intrusion into a pictorial genre characteristic of the English school. Fixing the movement of the waves while the snapshot is still stammering, combining two negatives, one for the sky and one for the sea, Le Gray plays like a virtuoso with a complex technique in the service of a lyrical vision, which prefigures marine studies by Courbet in the 1860s-1870s. The success was immense in France and England: these “enchanted paintings” were acquired by crowned heads, aristocrats, artists and art collectors.

Gustave Le Gray (French, 1820-1884)
Vapeur (Steam)
1856-1857
Print on albumen paper from a collodion glass negative
31.3 x 37.2cm
BnF, Department of Prints and Photography, ESERVE FOL-EO-13 (3)

Gustave Le Gray (French, 1820-1884)
Groupe de navires – Sète – Méditerranée – No. 10 (Group of ships – Sète – Mediterranean – No. 10)
1857
Print on albumen paper from a collodion glass negative
29.9 x 41.2cm
Former Alfred Armand collection
BnF, Department of Prints and Photography, RESERVE FOL-EO-13 (3)

Gustave Le Gray (French, 1820-1884)
La Vague brisée. Mer Méditerranée No. 15 (The Broken Wave. Mediterranean Sea No. 15)
1857
Photograph, albumen paper, collodion glass negative
41.7 x 32.5cm
BnF, Department of Prints and Photography, RESERVE FOL-EO-13 (3)

Gustave Le Gray (French, 1820-1884)
La Grande vague – Sète – N° 17 (The Great Wave)
1857
Photograph, albumen paper, collodion glass negative
35.7 x 41.9 cm
BnF, Department of Prints and Photography, RESERVE FOL-EO-13 (3)

Gustave Le Gray (French, 1820-1884)
Flotte franco-anglaise en rade de Cherbourg (Franco-English fleet in Cherbourg harbour)
August 4-8, 1858
Print on albumen paper from a collodion glass negative
31 x 39.8cm
Former Alfred Armand collection
BnF, Department of Prints and Photography, RESERVE FOL-EO-13 (3)

Félix Nadar (French, 1820-1910)
La Princesse Marie Cantacuzène (The Princesse Marie Cantacuzène)
around 1855-1860
Varnished salted paper print from a collodion glass negative
20.8 × 15.3cm
BnF, Department of Prints and Photography, EO-15 (2)-PET FOL

Nadar created two portraits of this classically beautiful young woman. It indicates on the back of one of the proofs that it is the Romanian princess, Marie Cantacuzène.

The portrait by Félix Nadar

Until the beginning of the 1880s, Félix Nadar’s portraits were distinguished by their neutral backgrounds.

The merit of Mr. Nadar’s portraits does not consist only in the skill of the pose, which is entirely artistic, there is a learned and reasoned arrangement of the light, which attenuates or increases the daylight depending on the character of the head. and the operator’s instinct. We also find in the printing of the proofs a delicate search for harmony and slightly faded tones which soften the edges of the contours with their darkness.

Félix Nadar (French, 1820-1910)
Bakounine
About 1862
Silver print from the original negative on collodion glass
27.1 × 20.6cm
BnF, Department of Prints and Photography, EO-15 (4)-FOL

The revolutionary, philosopher and theoretician of socialism Mikhail Bakunin is one of the immense personalities that Nadar photographed during his career and offered to clients in his constantly enriched portrait gallery. We see here a print from 1862, contemporary with the shooting, but there is also a print made twenty years later and finally a print around 1900, brought up to date after heavy retouching. Thus until the end of the activity of the Nadar workshop, the oldest portraits of celebrities were always offered to customers.

Félix Nadar (French, 1820-1910)
Jean Journet (1799-1861)
1857
Salted paper print from collodion glass negative
27.4 x 21.8cm
BnF, Department of Prints and Photography, EO-15 (9)-PET FOL

Jean Journet, nicknamed the Apostle, was a picturesque and eccentric Parisian figure, often ridiculed by his contemporaries. Former carbonaro, pharmacist in Limoux, he discovered the philosophy of Fourier and decided to spread his doctrine by abandoning his family and taking his pilgrim’s staff. His humanitarian evangelism, advocating fraternity and association, led him to write numerous pamphlets which he distributed in an untimely manner: by throwing them from “paradise” into theatres or by laying siege to famous writers and editorial offices. Interned several times in Bicêtre, Journet found upon his death a defender in Nadar who published an article in Le Figaro on October 27, 1861, concluding: “Ah my dear fools! that I love you much better than all these wise men.”

Nadar draws inspiration from Spanish painting from the Golden Age to render “this dazzling head of Saint Peter”.

Félix Nadar (French, 1820-1910)
Charles Asselineau (1820-1874)
Between 1854 and 1870
Print on albumen paper from a collodion glass negative
23.8 x 18.1cm
BnF, Department of Prints and Photography, EO-15 (1)-PET FOL

Charles Asselineau is one of Nadar’s oldest friends. They became friends at the Collège Bourbon and were both close friends of Baudelaire. A fine scholar and supernumerary librarian at Mazarine, Charles Asselineau, author of, among other things, Paradis des gens de lettres and L’Enfer du Bibliophile, was close to the publisher Poulet-Malassis, nicknamed by Baudelaire “Coco-mal-perché”. He collaborated with Nadar on two short stories published in April and August 1846: “The Healed Dead” and “The Found Paradise”, reprinted in When I Was a Student. He belonged to the small circle of editors who documented the Pantheon-Nadar to which biographies of each character were originally to be annexed.

He was Nadar’s best man at his wedding… warned, however, two weeks after the ceremony. The groom explained this in a letter: “It’s quite funny that my first witness learned of my marriage 15 days after the consummation and through an announcement letter. This, my good friend, will be explained to you by me on our first trip. I will limit myself to telling you for the present that I went to your house the day before, a Sunday and that on Monday morning at noon time fixed for the ceremony I did not know at 11 o’clock if I was getting married.” (NAF 25007, fol. 8).

Alexandre Rodtchenko (Russian, 1891-1956)
Jeune fille au Leica (Young girl with Leica)
1934
BnF, prints and photography

Piergiorgio Branzi (Italian, 1928-2022)
Bar sur la plage, Adriatique (Beach bar, Adriatic)
1957
BnF, prints and photography

Willy Ronis (French, 1910-2009)
Venise (Venice)
1959
BnF, prints and photography

Ray K. Metzker (American, 1931-2014)
Kayak, Frankfurt
1961, printed around 1970
Silver gelatin print
20 x 25.1cm
BnF, Department of Prints and Photography, EP-91 (1)-FOL
Purchase from the author, 1970
Courtesy Howard Greenberg Gallery, New York
© Estate of Ray K. Metzker

A student of Harry Callahan and Aaron Siskind at the Institute of Design in Chicago, Metzker sublimates the formal particularities of this school through exceptional mastery black and white: he excels at stylising reality by constructing his images in direct opposition to dark and light flat areas.

Mario Giacomelli (Italian, 1925-2000)
Je n’ai pas de main qui me caresse le visage (I have no Hands caress my face)
1961-1963
BnF, prints and photography

Daido Moriyama (Japanese, b. 1938)
Portrait d’acteur (Actor portrait)
1968
From the series Japanese theatre
BnF, prints and photography

André Kertész (Hungarian, 1894-1985)
1er janvier 1972 à la Martinique (January 1, 1972 in Martinique)
1972
BnF, prints and photography

Bernard Plossu (French, b. 1945)
Paris
1973
BnF, prints and photography

Mary Ellen Mark (American, 1940-2015)
Immigrants, Istanbul, Turkey
c. 1977
BnF, prints and photography

Koichi Kurita (Japanese, b. 1962)
Melting Snow on a Rock, Nagano, Japan
1988
BnF, prints and photography

Flor Garduño (Mexican, b. 1957)
Canasta de Luz (Corbeille de lumière)(Basket of Light)
1989
BnF, prints and photography

Laurence Leblanc (French, b. 1967)
Chéa, Cambodge (Chéa, Cambodia)
2000
From the series Rithy Chéa Kim Sour and the others
BnF, prints and photography

Bibliothèque François-Mitterrand
Quai François Mauriac, 75706 Paris Cedex 13
Phone: +33(0)1 53 79 59 59

Opening hours:
Monday: 2pm – 8pm
Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday: 9am – 8pm
Sunday: 1pm – 7pm

Bibliothèque François-Mitterrand website

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Exhibition: ‘Ruth Orkin: Bike Trip, USA, 1939’ at the Fondation Henri Cartier-Bresson, Paris

Exhibition dates: 19th September, 2023 – 14th January, 2024

Curator: Clément Chéroux, director, Fondation HCB

Ruth Orkin (American, 1921-1985)
My shadow down the hill
San Francisco, 1938
© 2023 Ruth Orkin Photo Archive

Wishing all readers of Art Blart a Happy New Year … but first, a glorious posting to finish the year 2023!

What a joy it is to see a young seventeen-year-old artist spreading their wings and taking such accomplished photographs. “Her photographs of street scenes, of buildings cut by subtle lighting effects, her poetic and touching images” are remarkable for their pictorial construction – framing, understanding and use of light and shadow, perspective – and how they tell the story in a single, beautiful image.

Of particular interest is

1/ How Orkin uses the bicycle and its shadow to frame subject matter, showing an implicit understanding of modernist photography. Images such as Thru the wheels of Commerce, Frisco dockyards on the photo album page San Francisco 1939 (below) are almost Duchampian in their conceptualisation. The artist’s use of near / far, high / low and the reverse of that perspective is exceptional.

2/ How Orkin constructs the pages of the photo album, neatly gridded in either horizontal or vertical photographs (never mixed). Through collective images and text this girded visualisation formalises the journey in her mind, illuminating what a transformative experience it must have been – a rite of passage between youth and adulthood (I have no details on when or why the photo album was constructed). What adventures she must have had, shooting-the-streets at 6am in the morning before going to an Italian grocery store for breakfast!

Further, in the photo album page San Francisco 1939 No’s 33-39 (below) we can observe in the young artist an understanding of how to sequence photographs in their ebb and flow: the bicycle framing the vanishing point in 33 leads to its inversion in Orkin’s shadow in 34; this shadow is echoed in the positive in the sculpture of Voleenteer Firemen (complete with misspelling) in 35 which then leads into the thrusting Italian Church of 36 … but here it is the hanging vegetation which is of import, for the vertical drapery is then inverted in the perspective of the ground shadow in 37 Weeping willows; the opening of the light in that image is echoed in the vista between the bicycle frame in 38 Bay from Cort Tower, this negative space then itself inverted in the self-portrait in 39.

3/ How the addition of text can provide a different interpretation to the images for the viewer. The media images were shorn of the text from the photo album pages (being cropped without text) – lack of con/text which to my eyes denudes them of Orkin’s interpretation and feelings about her images.

For example, the photograph captioned in the press images These people are standing in the middle of Washington St & reading the blackboard wall bulletins, on a newspaper office, Boston, 1939 (below) – reminiscent of Atget’s photograph Pendant l’éclipse (During the eclipse) 1912 (below) – is actually inscribed, These people are standing in the middle of Washington St & reading the blackboard wall bulletins, on a newspaper office. Sept 1.

Some may wonder why the deletion of “Sept 1” is so important… until you realise that Sept 1, 1939 was the day that Hitler’s Nazi Germany invaded Poland leading to the official start of World War 2 (although war had been raging in Manchuria between China and Japan since 1931). Without that word and number all we have in that photograph is a varied group of people looking up at news bulletins. But with their addition, and Orkin knew this only too well, the photograph assimilates the significance of world events into its very being … and then reflects back to the viewer an understanding of how those events will subsequently affect every person in that photograph. If that word and number is not there (as in the press images title) we would have never known the import of the moment that Orkin captured.

Finally, I would acknowledge the precocious talent of Ruth Orkin and her perspicacious (from Latin perspicax, perspicac– ‘seeing clearly’) nature. On this road trip she was young and full of joys of taking photographs, perceptive and aware of the world around her. For me the photographs are more than sketches that map out the beginnings of her photographic style – they are her style, fully formed and eloquent in their subtle, formal beauty. What an accomplishment for any artist no matter their age.

Dr Marcus Bunyan

Many thankx to the Fondation Henri Cartier-Bresson for allowing me to publish the photographs in the posting. Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.

L’exposition Ruth Orkin – Bike Trip, USA, 1939

Curator: Clément Chéroux

In 1939, at the age of 17, Ruth Orkin crossed the United States alone with her bike, her camera and only $25 in her pocket. This “bike trip” across the United States took her from Los Angeles to New York, where she planned to visit the World’s Fair. Her journey and her audacity, exceptional for the time, aroused the curiosity of the local press, which devoted numerous reports to her while she was there. It was during this epic bicycle trip that Ruth Orkin sketched out the beginnings of her photographic style. Her photographs of street scenes, of buildings cut by subtle lighting effects, her poetic and touching images, in which she doesn’t hesitate to stage her metal steed, will be shown for the first time in France at an exhibition at the Henri Cartier-Bresson Foundation. In 1951, having become a professional photographer (after working as a courier for MGM studios), Ruth Orkin produced her most famous image, American Girl in Italy, showing a woman travelling alone, under the gaze of the men who surround her and occupy public space, as a nod to her personal experience.

Text from the Fondation Henri Cartier-Bresson website

Ruth Orkin (American, 1921-1985)
My shadow down the hill
San Francisco, 1938
© 2023 Ruth Orkin Photo Archive

Ruth Orkin (American, 1921-1985)
Bay from Coit Tower, Treasure Island at left
San Francisco, 1938
© 2023 Ruth Orkin Photo Archive

Ruth Orkin (American, 1921-1985)
San Francisco 1939
1939
From the series Ruth Orkin: Bike Trip, USA, 1939
© 2023 Ruth Orkin Photo Archive

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Pendant l’éclipse (During the eclipse)
1912
Albumen print

Although the moon is not visible in this photograph by Eugène Atget, its presence and appeal are implied. The crowd gathered in Paris’s Place de la Bastille on April 17, 1912, was observing a solar eclipse through viewing apparatuses. Atget, rather than recording the astronomical event itself, turned his attention to its spectators. Though Atget made more than 8,500 pictures of Paris and its environs in a career that spanned over thirty years – most documenting the built environment – this photograph is an unusual example that focuses on a crowd of people.

Text from the MoMA website

Ruth Orkin (American, 1921-1985)
These people are standing in the middle of Washington St & reading the blackboard wall bulletins, on a newspaper office
Boston, 1939
© 2023 Ruth Orkin Photo Archive

Ruth Orkin (American, 1921-1985)
These people are standing in the middle of Washington St & reading the blackboard wall bulletins, on a newspaper office. Sept 1.
Boston, 1939
From the series Ruth Orkin: Bike Trip, USA, 1939
© 2023 Ruth Orkin Photo Archive

Ruth Orkin (American, 1921-1985)
Chicago 1939
1939
From the series Ruth Orkin: Bike Trip, USA, 1939
© 2023 Ruth Orkin Photo Archive

Ruth Orkin (American, 1921-1985)
U.S. Continent and Chicago 1939
1939
From the series Ruth Orkin: Bike Trip, USA, 1939
© 2023 Ruth Orkin Photo Archive

Exhibition

For the first time in France, the Fondation Henri Cartier-Bresson presents a solo exhibition on American photographer Ruth Orkin (1921-1985), internationally known for her photograph American Girl in Italy (1951), an iconic image of a women travelling alone. While still a teenager, Orkin undertook a pioneering journey across the United States from West to East.

In 1939, at 17 and still living with her parents in Los Angeles, Ruth Orkin decided to cross the United States solo, from the Pacific to the Atlantic. She travelled less by bicycle than with a bicycle, crossing long distances by car, train, and bus, using her bicycle to explore big cities: Chicago, Philadelphia, Washington, New York, Boston and San Francisco.

Over a four-month period, she took 350 photographs: urban scenes, numerous self-portraits and striking compositions framed by her bicycle. In each city she visited, local newspapers covered her story, interviewing and photographing her. With the unexpected publicity, she was invited everywhere, given tickets to shows, and even received a new two-wheeler.

Orkin’s stated aim upon departure was to visit the New York World’s Fair, but the transcontinental adventure proved far more decisive. It was a defining moment in her personal and artistic development, confirming the old adage: it’s not the destination, it’s the journey.

The exhibition brings together around forty photographs and archival documents, including Ruth Orkin’s manuscript on this adventure.

Biography

Born in Boston in 1921, Ruth Orkin grew up in Hollywood. At the age of 10, she received her first camera and began photographing her friends and teachers at school. In 1938, at 17 years old, she took a monumental bicycle trip across the United States from Los Angeles to New York City to see the 1939 World’s Fair, and she photographed along the way.

In 1943, the photographer moved to New York where worked for all the major magazines, including LIFE, which sent her to Israel in 1951. She then went to Italy, where she met Jinx Allen, an art student and fellow American, who became the subject of American Girl in Italy. The photograph was part of a series titled When You Travel Alone, about what they encountered as women traveling alone in Europe after the war.

On her return to New York, Orkin married the photographer and filmmaker Morris Engel. Together they produced two feature films, including Little Fugitive, which was nominated at the Oscar in 1953. From their New York apartment overlooking Central Park, Orkin photographed numerous events (marathons, parades, concerts) and the beauty of the changing seasons. Ruth Orkin passed away in 1985.

Text from the Fondation Henri Cartier-Bresson website

Ruth Orkin (American, 1921-1985)
Conn & the Sound. Nearly lost my camera taking these because of wind
New England, 1939
© 2023 Ruth Orkin Photo Archive

Ruth Orkin (American, 1921-1985)
Conn & the Sound. Nearly lost my camera taking these because of wind
New England, 1939
From the series Ruth Orkin: Bike Trip, USA, 1939
© 2023 Ruth Orkin Photo Archive

Long Island Sound is a marine sound and tidal estuary of the Atlantic Ocean. It lies predominantly between the U.S. state of Connecticut to the north and Long Island in New York to the south. From west to east, the sound stretches 110 mi (180 km) from the East River in New York City, along the North Shore of Long Island, to Block Island Sound. A mix of freshwater from tributaries, and saltwater from the Atlantic Ocean, Long Island Sound is 21 mi (34 km) at its widest point and varies in depth from 65 to 230 feet (20 to 70 m).

Text from the Wikipedia website

Ruth Orkin (American, 1921-1985)
Washington 1939
1939
From the series Ruth Orkin: Bike Trip, USA, 1939
© 2023 Ruth Orkin Photo Archive

Ruth Orkin (American, 1921-1985)
Washington Monument as seen from the Lincoln Memorial & reflected in the Mall
Washington D.C., 1939
© 2023 Ruth Orkin Photo Archive

Ruth Orkin (American, 1921-1985)
Washington Monument as seen from the Lincoln Memorial & reflected in the Mall
Washington D.C., 1939
From the series Ruth Orkin: Bike Trip, USA, 1939
© 2023 Ruth Orkin Photo Archive

Ruth Orkin (American, 1921-1985)
“Through the Wheels of Justice” The Supreme Court across from Capitol Hill
Washington D.C., 1939
© 2023 Ruth Orkin Photo Archive

Ruth Orkin (American, 1921-1985)
“Through the Wheels of Justice” The Supreme Court across from Capitol Hill
Washington D.C., 1939
From the series Ruth Orkin: Bike Trip, USA, 1939
© 2023 Ruth Orkin Photo Archive

Ruth Orkin (American, 1921-1985)
“EI” running over a slum street. Municipal building in background
New York, 1939
© 2023 Ruth Orkin Photo Archive

Ruth Orkin (American, 1921-1985)
“EI” running over a slum street. Municipal building in background
New York, 1939
From the series Ruth Orkin: Bike Trip, USA, 1939
© 2023 Ruth Orkin Photo Archive

Ruth Orkin (American, 1921-1985)
Sunset over lower Manhattan
New York, 1939
© 2023 Ruth Orkin Photo Archive

Ruth Orkin (American, 1921-1985)
Sunset over lower Manhattan
New York, 1939
From the series Ruth Orkin: Bike Trip, USA, 1939
© 2023 Ruth Orkin Photo Archive

Ruth Orkin (American, 1921-1985)
17-Year-Old Girl Pedals Bicycle From Los Angeles to Boston, newspaper clipping from Boston
August 1939
© 2023 Ruth Orkin Photo Archive

Map describing the route taken by car
1939
© 2023 Ruth Orkin Photo Archive

Ruth Orkin (American, 1921-1985)
An American Girl in Italy
Florence, 1951
© 1952, 1980 Ruth Orkin Photo Archive

Fondation Henri Cartier-Bresson
79 rue des Archives
75003 Paris

Opening hours:
Tuesday – Sunday 11am – 7pm
Closed on Mondays

Fondation Henri Cartier-Bresson website

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Exhibition: ‘Hiroshi Sugimoto: Time Machine’ at the Hayward Gallery, London

Exhibition dates: 11th October 2023 -⁠ 7th January 2024

Curators: Hiroshi Sugimoto: Time Machine is curated by Hayward Gallery Director Ralph Rugoff with Assistant Curators Thomas Sutton and Gilly Fox, and Curatorial Assistant Suzanna Petot.

Please note: The (retired) WordPress theme that I have been using since Art Blart started in 2009, and which was the look of the site, decided to stop loading the posts on desktop and iPad. No support and it will not be fixed. So please bear with me as I customise and adjust the site to the new theme… a lot of work! ~ Marcus

Rachael Smith
Hiroshi Sugimoto in the Hayward Gallery with his ‘Seascapes’ series
2023

The world is a reality,
not because of the way it is,
but because
of the possibilities it presents

Frederick Sommer

Almost real

I have an ambivalent relationship with the work of Hiroshi Sugimoto.

On the one hand I truly admire the beauty and presence of Sugimoto’s photographs; how his images “contradict the medium’s conventional tasks – to record reality as precisely as possible”; and how his work, through an investigation of “fundamental questions of space and time, past and present, art and science, imagination and reality” push at the boundaries of what a photograph is and can be through an exploration of the very nature of photography.

Through this erudite, conceptual, scientific and creative investigation, Sugimoto’s staged images proffer a reorientation of the referent – of the world, in the world – unsettling the certainty of the truth of the photograph as a visual record of the world.

In my favourite series – such as the movie in a moment Theaters (1976 – ), the stuffed animal Dioramas (1974 – ), some of the wax works dead pan Portraits (1999 -) (particularly Oscar Wilde, Queen Victoria and Princess Diana), and the Seascapes (1980 -) – I feel released from the bounds of reality as we perceive it. The artist takes me out of myself and into a new plane of existence. He has reanimated the in/animate through an alchemical process, a mystery of mysteries, to create new life – a transubstantiation of the elements earth, air, water, fire.

On the other hand I am less impressed with bodies of work that simply do not work for me… that leave me feeling cold, lifeless. Series such as Revolution (1990/2012), Lightning Fields (2009), Photogenic Drawings (2009), Architecture (1997 – below) and the recent Opticks (2018 – below), while not derivative, owe a great debt to other artists that have already strode that golden path… and have done it better.

As I have observed in another review of Sugimoto’s work: “I’m not saying Sugimoto is derivative but because of these other works, they don’t have much room to move. Indeed, they hardly move at all. They are so frozen in attitude that all the daring transcendence of light, the light! of space time travel, the transition from one state to another, has been lost. The Flame of Recognition (Edward Weston) – has gone.”

Taking his work as a whole, we observe in Sugimoto’s work a slightly malevolent aura – follow my argument here – not in the sense of the work “showing a wish to do evil to others” but through the photographs unsettling ability to confound the reality of others. The artist’s work is very male/volent, very masculine and in the Latin etymology of the word “volent” (present participle of velle to will, wish) very much (reality) constructed at the will and wish of the artist.

While Sugimoto’s volition (from Latin volo ‘I wish’) creates beautiful and subversive images of true presence and power, it is the artist’s ability to will into existence images that engage with mystical forces beyond the apparent and the factual but which live as completely real and part of the total world of man and nature … that is his most impressive attribute as an artist. Through his photographs he brings to consciousness things only a small portion of which most of us experience directly.1

Dr Marcus Bunyan

1/ Adapted from Ansel Adams’ essay for The Flame of Recognition 1964 in “Edward Weston’s The Flame of Recognition” on the Aperture website August 12, 2015 [Online] Cited 22/12/2023

Many thankx to the Hayward Gallery for allowing me to publish the photographs in the posting. Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.

“All my life I have made a habit of never believing my eyes.”

Hiroshi Sugimoto

“Sugimoto’s unique accomplishments in his genre contradict the medium’s conventional tasks – to record reality as precisely as possible. In Sugimoto’s work, one is confronted with the formal reduction of conceptual images, in which he addresses fundamental questions of space and time, past and present, art and science, imagination and reality. “I was concerned,” noted the artist in 2002, “with revealing an ancient stage of human memory through the medium of photography. Whether it is individual memory or the cultural memory of mankind itself, my work is about returning to the past and remembering where we came from and how we came about.” His pictures, which leave a lasting impression through their beauty and their auratic effect, interweave Japanese traditions with Western ideas. This East-West dialogue remains characteristic of his work today, which is captivating in its exceptional craftsmanship and strong aesthetic presence, and can exercise an almost magical effect on viewers.”

Anonymous. “Hiroshi Sugimoto. Revolution,” on the Museum Brandhorst website February 8, 2013

Hiroshi Sugimoto | curator tour with Ralph Rugoff | Hayward Gallery

Hiroshi Sugimoto: ‘My camera works as a time machine’ | Hayward Gallery

‘A camera can be able to stop the world, in that we stop the world and then investigate what is there, carefully.’

~ Hiroshi Sugimoto

Ahead of the opening of Hiroshi Sugimoto: Time Machine at the Hayward Gallery – the largest survey to date of the Sugimoto’s works – we travelled to meet the photographer at the Enoura Observatory in Japan. Situated against the outer rim of the country’s Hakone Mountains, the observatory was designed by Sugimoto as a forum for disseminating art and culture.

In this short video interview Sugimoto considers the impact of the invention of the camera – with this new ability to pause the world around us – and explains how his own photography, such as his Seascapes series, draws on this idea of the camera’s ability to distort linear time.

Dioramas (1974 – )

Installation view of Hiroshi Sugimoto, Dioramas (1974 – ) Silver gelatin prints
Photo: Mark Blower. Courtesy the artist and the Hayward Gallery

‘My life as an artist began the moment I saw that I had succeeded in bringing the bear back to life on film,’ said Sugimoto about his 1976 work Polar Bear. The image is of an Arctic diorama in the American Museum of Natural History in New York, but through clever use of framing and exposure, Sugimoto was able to make the scene appear real. As well as revisiting the museum, and others across the US, to expand his Dioramas series, Sugimoto later took a similar approach to the waxworks of Madame Tussauds in his Portraits. By removing the figures from their staged displays, and photographing them against a black backdrop with sympathetic lighting, the artist gave the impression that these famous faces had themselves modelled for his portraiture.

Installation view of Hiroshi Sugimoto, Polar Bear, 1976. Silver gelatin print
Photo: Mark Blower. Courtesy the artist and the Hayward Gallery

Hiroshi Sugimoto (Japanese, b. 1948)
Polar Bear
1976
From the Dioramas series
Gelatin silver print
© Hiroshi Sugimoto, courtesy of the artist

“Polar Bear” (1976) shows the majestic white animal roaring over a fresh kill: the bloodied body of a seal whose inert form is bulky and dark against an Arctic white background that stretches into the distance. Look closely and behind the bear – with its luscious coat of fur, its big paws so heavy in the snow you can almost hear it crunch – the line between two and three dimensions is just visible: a jagged crevasse in the ice floe beneath the two animals merges almost seamlessly with a painted backdrop of receding icy peaks.

The eye judders between these realities. The dead bear, momentarily brought to life by the vividness of the photograph, dies again, and is preserved again, a copy of a copy, frozen between past and present. Similar fates await a pair of ostriches defending their new hatchlings against a family of wart hogs (“Ostrich-Wart Hog,” 1980) and a placidly floating mother manatee and her calf (“Manatee,” 1994).

Emily LaBarge. “What Is Photography? (No Need to Answer That),” on the New York Times website Nov. 21, 2023 [Online] Cited 23/11/2023

Hiroshi Sugimoto (Japanese, b. 1948)
Manatee
1994
From the Dioramas series
Gelatin silver print
© Hiroshi Sugimoto, courtesy of the artist

Hiroshi Sugimoto (Japanese, b. 1948)
Earliest Human Relatives
1994
From the Dioramas series
Gelatin silver print
© Hiroshi Sugimoto, courtesy of Marian Goodman Gallery

Theaters (1976 – ) and Abandoned Theaters (2015 – )

Hiroshi Sugimoto (Japanese, b. 1948)
UA Playhouse, New York
1978
Gelatin silver print
© Hiroshi Sugimoto, courtesy of the artist

Installation view of Hiroshi Sugimoto, Theaters series (1976 – ) Gelatin silver prints
Photo: Mark Blower. Courtesy the artist and the Hayward Gallery

Installation view of Hiroshi Sugimoto, Goshen Indiana, 1980. Gelatin silver print
Photo: Mark Blower. Courtesy the artist and the Hayward Gallery

Installation view of Hiroshi Sugimoto, Cabot Street Cinema, Beverly, Massachusetts 1978. Gelatin silver print

Installation view of Hiroshi Sugimoto, Abandoned Theaters series (2015 – ). Gelatin silver prints
Photo: Mark Blower. Courtesy the artist and the Hayward Gallery

Hiroshi Sugimoto (Japanese, b. 1948)
Kenosha Theater, Kenosha
2015
Gelatin silver print
© Hiroshi Sugimoto, courtesy of the artist

Installation view of Hiroshi Sugimoto, Union City Drive-in, Union City, 1993. Gelatin silver print
Photo: Mark Blower. Courtesy the artist and the Hayward Gallery

Hiroshi Sugimoto (Japanese, b. 1948)
Union City Drive-in, Union City
1993
Gelatin silver print
© Hiroshi Sugimoto, courtesy of the artist

The largest survey to date of Hiroshi Sugimoto, an artist renowned for creating some of the most alluringly enigmatic photographs of our time. Over the past 50 years, Sugimoto has created pictures which are meticulously crafted, deeply thought-provoking and quietly subversive.

Featuring key works from all of the artist’s major photographic series, this survey highlights Sugimoto’s philosophical yet playful inquiry into our understanding of time and memory, and photography’s ability to both document and invent.

The exhibition also includes lesser-known works that reveal the artist’s interest in the history of photography, as well as in mathematics and optical sciences.

Often employing a large-format wooden camera and mixing his own darkroom chemicals, Sugimoto has repeatedly re-explored ideas and practices from 19th century photography while capturing subjects including dioramas, wax figures and architecture. His work has stretched and rearranged concepts of time, space and light that are integral to the medium.

Born and raised in Tokyo, Japan, Hiroshi Sugimoto divides his time between Tokyo and New York City. Over the past five decades, his photographs have received international acclaim and have been presented in major institutions across the globe.

While best known as a photographer, Sugimoto has more recently added architecture and sculpture to his multidisciplinary practice, as well as being artistic director on performing arts productions.

Text from the Hayward Gallery website

Seascapes (1980 -)

Installation view of Hiroshi Sugimoto, Seascapes series. Gelatin silver prints
Photo: Mark Blower. Courtesy the artist and the Hayward Gallery

Hiroshi Sugimoto (Japanese, b. 1948)
Bay of Sagami, Atami
1997
From the Seascapes series
Gelatin silver print
© Hiroshi Sugimoto, courtesy of the artist

Architecture (1997 – )

Installation view of Hiroshi Sugimoto, Chrysler Building 1997. Gelatin silver print
Photo: Mark Blower. Courtesy the artist and the Hayward Gallery

Hiroshi Sugimoto (Japanese, b. 1948)
Chrysler Building
1997
Gelatin silver print
© Hiroshi Sugimoto, courtesy of the artist

Hiroshi Sugimoto (Japanese, b. 1948)
World Trade Center
1997
Gelatin silver print
© Hiroshi Sugimoto, courtesy of the artist

Hiroshi Sugimoto (Japanese, b. 1948)
Eiffel Tower
1998
Gelatin silver print
© Hiroshi Sugimoto, courtesy of the artist

Over the past 50 years, Hiroshi Sugimoto has created some of the most alluringly enigmatic photographs of our time: pictures that are precisely crafted and deeply thought-provoking, familiar yet tantalisingly ambiguous. Featuring key works from all of the artist’s major photographic series, this survey highlights the artist’s philosophical yet playful inquiry into our understanding of time and memory, and the ambiguous character of photography as a medium suited to both documentation and invention.

The exhibition also includes lesser-known works that illuminate the artist’s interest in the history of photography as well as in mathematics and optical sciences. Often employing a large-format wooden camera, mixing his own darkroom chemicals and developing his black-and-white prints by hand, Sugimoto has repeatedly re-explored ideas and practices from 19th century photography, including subjects such as dioramas, wax figures and architecture. In the process, his work has stretched and rearranged concepts of time, space and light that are integral to the medium.

Hiroshi Sugimoto says: “The camera is a time machine capable of representing the sense of time… The camera can capture more than a single moment, it can capture history, geological time, the concept of eternity, the essence of time itself… The more I think about that sense of time, the more I think this is probably one of the key factors of how humans became humans.”

Ralph Rugoff, Director of the Hayward Gallery, says: “Hiroshi Sugimoto is a brilliant visual poet of paradox, a polymath postmodern who embraces meticulous old school craftsmanship to produce exquisite, uncanny pictures that reference science and maths as well as abstract art and Renaissance portraits. Juggling different conceptions of time, and evoking visions ranging from primordial prehistory to the end of civilisation, his photographs ingeniously recalibrate our basic assumptions about the medium, and alter our sense of history, time and existence itself. Amidst all his peers, his work stands apart for its depth and striking originality of thought.”

Time Machine commences with a selection of Sugimoto’s black-and-white photographs of natural history dioramas, a series he began in the mid-1970s. The Dioramas photos draw attention less to the natural world than to its theatrical representation in museums, whilst at the same time conjuring what the artist has called the ‘fragility of existence’.

The subject of time is also explored in two subsequent bodies of work featured in the exhibition: shot in movie palaces as well as drive-ins, Sugimoto’s Theaters (1976 – ) capture entire films with a single long exposure, thus compressing all the dramatic action that appeared on screen into a single image of radiant whiteness. His renowned Seascapes (1980 -), which depict evenly divided expanses of sea and sky unmarked by any trace of human existence, are equally beguiling in their temporal reference, evoking the immediacy of abstract painting even as they speak to Sugimoto’s interest in focusing on vistas that, as he remarks, “are before human beings and after human beings.”

For Architecture (1997 – ), a series of deliberately out-of-focus studies of iconic modernist buildings – ranging from the Eiffel Tower to the Twin Towers – Sugimoto displays the expansive ambiguity that informs his art, at the same time conveying a sense of the visual germ of an idea in an architect’s imagination, as well as fashioning ghostly images of what he has described as “architecture after the end of the world.” For his subsequent Portraits (1999) series, meanwhile, the artist focused his camera on wax models of famous historical figures from Madame Tussauds; rendered more life-like in black-and-white, figures ranging from Queen Elizabeth II to Oscar Wilde and Salvador Dali take on a disarmingly lively appearance, underscoring the camera’s potential for altering our perception. As the artist has noted, “However fake the subject, once photographed, it’s as good as real.”

A final section of Hiroshi Sugimoto: Time Machine focuses on photographs that evoke different notions of timelessness, including his Sea of Buddha (1995) series, which portrays an installation in a 12th century Kyoto temple featuring 1001 gilded wooden statues of Buddha; and Lightning Fields (2006 – ), spectacular camera-less photographs created by exposing sensitised paper to electrical impulses produced by a Van der Graaf generator.

The exhibition comes to a stunning conclusion with a gallery dedicated to Sugimoto’s Opticks (2018 – ), intensely coloured photographs of prism-refracted light. Taking inspiration from Newton’s research into the properties of light whilst calling to mind colour field painting and artists like Mark Rothko, Opticks presents deeply immersive fields of subtly varying hues.

Alongside his photographs, two of Sugimoto’s elegantly contoured and polished aluminium sculptural models are presented, alluding to both mathematical equations and the abstract forms favoured by modernists such as Constantin Brâncuși.

The exhibition is accompanied by a fully-illustrated, 216pp catalogue with newly commissioned essays and an illustrated chronology, co-published with Hatje Cantz. Texts by Ralph Rugoff (on Dioramas), James Attlee (on Theaters), Mami Kataoka (on Seascapes), Lara Strongman (on Portraits), Geoffrey Batchen (on Lightning Fields), Edmund de Waal (on Sea of Buddha), Margaret Wertheim (on Conceptual Forms), Allie Biswas (on Opticks) and David Chipperfield (in conversation, on Architecture).

The show is set to tour internationally in 2024, at the UCCA Center for Contemporary Art (23 March – 23 June 2024) and The Museum of Contemporary Art Australia (2 August – 27 October 2024).

Press release from the Hayward Gallery

Sea of Buddha (1995)

Installation views of Hiroshi Sugimoto, Sea of Buddha series. Gelatin silver prints
Photo: Mark Blower. Courtesy the artist and the Hayward Gallery

Installation view of Hiroshi Sugimoto, Sea of Buddha 049 (Triptych) 1995. Gelatin silver print
Photo: Mark Blower. Courtesy the artist and the Hayward Gallery

Hiroshi Sugimoto (Japanese, b. 1948)
Sea of Buddha 049 (Triptych)
1995
Gelatin silver print
© Hiroshi Sugimoto, courtesy of the artist

Chamber of Horrors (1994 – ) and Portraits (1999 -)

Installation view of Hiroshi Sugimoto, Chamber of Horrors series. Gelatin silver prints
Photo: Mark Blower. Courtesy the artist and the Hayward Gallery

Installation view of Hiroshi Sugimoto, The Garrote 1994. Gelatin silver print
Photo: Mark Blower. Courtesy the artist and the Hayward Gallery

Installation view of Hiroshi Sugimoto, The Electric Chair 1994. Gelatin silver print
Photo: Mark Blower. Courtesy the artist and the Hayward Gallery

Hiroshi Sugimoto (Japanese, b. 1948)
The Electric Chair
1994
From the series The Chamber of Horrors
Gelatin silver print
© Hiroshi Sugimoto, courtesy of the artist

Installation view of Hiroshi Sugimoto, The Plague, 1994. Gelatin silver print
Photo: Mark Blower. Courtesy the artist and the Hayward Gallery

Installation view of Hiroshi Sugimoto, Portraits series. Gelatin silver prints
Photo: Mark Blower. Courtesy the artist and the Hayward Gallery

Installation view of Hiroshi Sugimoto, Anne Boleyn 1999. Gelatin silver print
Photo: Mark Blower. Courtesy the artist and the Hayward Gallery

Hiroshi Sugimoto (Japanese, b. 1948)
Anne Boleyn
1999
Gelatin silver print
© Hiroshi Sugimoto, courtesy of the artist

Installation view of Hiroshi Sugimoto, Queen Victoria 1999. Gelatin silver print
Photo: Mark Blower. Courtesy the artist and the Hayward Gallery

Hiroshi Sugimoto (Japanese, b. 1948)
Queen Victoria
1999
Gelatin silver print
© Hiroshi Sugimoto, courtesy of the artist

Hiroshi Sugimoto (Japanese, b. 1948)
Salvador Dali
1999
Gelatin silver print
© Hiroshi Sugimoto, courtesy of the artist

Hiroshi Sugimoto (Japanese, b. 1948)
Oscar Wilde
1999
Gelatin silver print
© Hiroshi Sugimoto, courtesy of the artist

Installation views of Hiroshi Sugimoto, Diana, Princess of Wales 1999. Gelatin silver print
Photo: Mark Blower. Courtesy the artist and the Hayward Gallery

Hiroshi Sugimoto (Japanese, b. 1948)
Diana, Princess of Wales
1999
Gelatin silver print
© Hiroshi Sugimoto, courtesy of the artist

Lightning Fields (2006 – )

Installation view of Hiroshi Sugimoto, Lightning Fields 163 2009. Gelatin silver print
Photo: Mark Blower. Courtesy the artist and the Hayward Gallery

Hiroshi Sugimoto (Japanese, b. 1948)
Lightning Fields 225
2009
Gelatin silver print
© Hiroshi Sugimoto, courtesy of the artist

Hiroshi Sugimoto: formative years and significant works

For five decades the work of photographer Hiroshi Sugimoto has received international acclaim, whilst being presented in major galleries and institutions the world over.

Sugimoto’s photographs are meticulously crafted, often stretching and rearranging the concept of time, and our understanding of the world around us, and he has often re-explored ideas and practices from photography’s earliest exponents. Over the past 50 years, he has often revisited and expanded upon his own ideas, and series, which we take a closer look at, along with the artist’s formative years, here.

Hiroshi Sugimito: early years

Hiroshi Sugimoto was born in Tokyo in 1948 to a family of merchants. Among the young Sugimoto’s interests were trains, electronics, carpentry and photography, with his early fascination with the latter further enhanced by one of his elementary school science teachers, who showed Sugimoto and his classmates how to use photosensitive paper to make photograms. ‘He used spoons and forks and other items and he exposed the paper under the light for five or six minutes.’ explained Sugimoto, looking back. ‘When he removed it, the shapes of the spoons and forks remained on the paper. It was an amazing experience for me that left a lasting impression’.

At the age of 12 Sugimoto was given his first camera, a Mamiya 6 medium-format, by his father, which he would use to take photographs of trains and gather reference material for model-making. When he moved on to high school, Sugimoto joined the photography club and also began developing an interest in the cinema, which he would visit regularly. It wasn’t long before his love of film and photography combined, as he recalls, ‘Audrey Hepburn was beautiful and I fell in love with her on the screen. I wanted her portrait so I brought my Minolta SR7 camera into a movie theatre, and I studied how to stop the image on the screen. I found that one-fifteenth and one-thirteenth of a second stops the image’.

In 1970, after graduating in Economics from Tokyo’s Rikkyo University, Sugimoto backpacked across Russia and Europe. Influenced by communist ideology, and the writings of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels as a student, he had wanted to experience Russian society, but disillusioned by what he found, he duly continued on to Europe. ‘I kept moving westwards. I stayed in Moscow for a few weeks and took another train to Poland, and then to Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria and other Eastern European countries. After several weeks I arrived in Vienna for my first taste of Western civilization’.

Hiroshi Sugimoto in America

Later in 1970 Sugimoto would get another taste of Western civilisation as he travelled to the US, and California. Here he studied at Los Angeles’ ArtCentre College of Design, specialising in photography. Speaking of his studies here, Sugimoto has said ‘ArtCenter College was more like a training school for technicians: car design and advertising. For photography you trained to be a commercial photographer, which is what I wanted. I wasn’t interested in academic study at all’.

After completing his study in Los Angeles Sugimoto moved to New York in 1974 in order to pursue a full-time career in photography. Here, Sugimoto soon became part of the city’s hippy counter-culture. ‘I got serious about using photography as a tool in my art after I moved to New York’, says Sugimoto. ‘I saw many good shows, mainly minimalist shows: Sol LeWitt, Dan Flavin, Donald Judd. When I moved to the East Coast I found so many interesting people that I decided to stay. I’d just finished my photographic studies and was hungry to work. Since photography was considered a second-class citizen in the art world then why not use photography? It was more interesting for me to start with something a step down and bring it up’.

Dioramas

In 1974, Sugimoto made his first visit to the American Museum of Natural History in New York, it was a visit that would inspire his first major breakthrough in photography. ‘I made a curious discovery while at the exhibition of animal dioramas,’ the artist explains. ‘The stuffed animals positioned before painted backdrops looked utterly fake, yet by taking a quick peek with one eye closed, all perspective vanished, and suddenly they looked very real. I had found a way to see the world as a camera does. However fake the subject, once photographed, it’s as good as real’.

Inspired by these taxidermy dioramas, he went on to commence his Dioramas series, which among its initial works included Polar Bear (1976) and Hyena – Jackal – Vulture (1976). Sugimoto would return to this idea two decades on, adding more works to Dioramas in the 1990s including 1994’s Earliest Human Relatives. In 1978 Polar Bear was acquired by The Museum of Modern Art, representing Sugimoto’s first photographic sale. The work was also exhibited in the museum’s Recent Acquisitions show, that same year.

Theaters

It was whilst working on his Dioramas series, that Sugimoto also found the inspiration for his next series, Theaters, as he would later detail. ‘I am a habitual self-interlocutor. One evening while taking photographs at the American Museum of Natural History, I had a near-hallucinatory vision. My internal question-and-answer session leading up to this vision went something like this: ‘Suppose you shoot a whole movie in a single frame?’ The answer: ‘You get a shining screen.’ Immediately I began experimenting in order to realise this vision’.

He began this series in 1976, by photographing St. Marks Cinema in Manhattan’s East Village, and the first group of works would also see Sugimoto capture other movie theatres and cinemas in the Northeast and Midwest of the US. It was an approach that the photographer has returned to again and again over the course of his career, firstly in 1993 when he broadened the Theaters series to include depictions of Drive-Ins across the US. The photographer later travelled to Europe, primarily Italy, to replicate the approach with Opera Houses in 2014, and then in 2015 began photographing Abandoned Theaters.

Seascapes

The seeds for Sugimoto’s Seascapes series were sown in 1980. ‘One New York night, during another of my internal question-and-answer sessions I pictured two great mountains’, the photographer has explained. ‘One, today’s Mount Fuji, and the other, Mount Hakone in the days before its summit collapsed, creating the Ashinoko crater lake. When hiking up from the foothills of Hakone, one would see a second freestanding peak as tall as Mount Fuji. Two rivals in height – what a magnificent sight that must have been! Unfortunately, the topography has changed. Although the land is forever changing its form, the sea, I thought, is immutable. Thus began my travels back through time to the ancient seas of the world’.

Sugimoto began the series that same year with a photograph of the Caribbean Sea, taken from a bluff in Jamaica while on a family holiday to the island. Seascapes would subsequently lead Sugimoto across the globe, photographing bodies of water from the Ligurian Sea viewed from Italy to the North Pacific Ocean viewed from Japan.

Chamber of Horrors and Portraits

In 1994 Sugimoto made his first visit to Madame Tussaud’s in London, where he photographed his Chamber of Horrors series on location. ‘I saw the blade that guillotined Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette, and the electric chair that executed the Lindbergh baby’s kidnapper, among other exhibits. They all looked very real to me’, Sugimoto said. ‘To corroborate these various murderous instruments invented by civilised men, I took the requisite eye-witness photographs: thus did people in times past face death head on’.

Sugimoto would return to the wax museum five years later to photograph his Portraits series, for which he was given special permission to remove selected figures from the display to photograph individually, among them Diana, Princess of Wales (1999), Fidel Castro (1999) and Anne of Cleeves (1999). However, he found that the exhibits he had previously captured for Chamber of Horrors had now been removed from the museum. ‘When I asked why,’ he said ‘I was told they’d been removed in a gesture to political correctness. Must we moderns be so sheltered from death?’

Opticks

In 2018 Sugimoto began printing his Opticks series, which was inspired by an 1704 work of the same name by Isaac Newton, in which Newton, through his experiments with prisms presented proof that natural light was not purely white. Drawing on Newton’s approach, Sugimoto used a batch of Polaroid film he had been gifted – one of the last batches of film Polaroid ever produced – along with a glass prism and a mirror to create condensed vivid compositions of pure colour. Sugimoto then enlarged these works into chromogenic prints. Opticks was presented for the first time in 2020 at the Kyoto City KYOCERA Museum of Art in Japan, and received its first UK presentation here at the Hayward Gallery.

Anonymous. “Hiroshi Sugimoto: formative years and significant works,” on the Hayward Gallery website Fri Nov 17, 2023 [Online] Cited 19/11/2023

Opticks (2018 – )

Installation views of Hiroshi Sugimoto, Opticks series. Chromogenic prints
Photo: Mark Blower. Courtesy the artist and the Hayward Gallery

Opticks isn’t the only series in which Sugimoto has experimented with historic techniques. In his 2006 series Lightning Fields, informed by the work of 19th century photography pioneer Henry Fox Talbot, Sugimoto captured the lightning-like shapes of electrical currents as they passed across a negatively-charged metal plate.

In his commitment to historic approaches the artist had initially attempted to supply the current to the plates using a hand-operated 18th century Wimshurst Electrostatic Machine, before switching to a more consistent Van de Graaff Generator.

In 2009, Sugimoto was gifted a batch of colour Polaroid film to see how a photographer who worked primarily in black and white might use it. This proved to be one of the last batches of the film ever produced (Polaroid went out of business in that same year) and would eventually find use in Sugimoto’s 2018 series, Opticks.

The images in Opticks – Sugimoto’s newest series, which has yet to be featured in any surveys of the artist’s work – are inspired by Isaac Newton’s seminal 1704 work of the same name, in which he presented proof that natural light was not purely white. Taking his cue from Newton’s experiments with prisms, Sugimoto used the Polaroid, along with glass and a mirror, to create condensed yet vivid compositions of colour in its purest form, before later enlarging these works into chromogenic prints.

Installation views of Hiroshi Sugimoto, Opticks series. Chromogenic print
Photo: Mark Blower. Courtesy the artist and the Hayward Gallery

Installation view of Hiroshi Sugimoto, Opticks series. Chromogenic print
Photo: Mark Blower. Courtesy the artist and the Hayward Gallery

Rachael Smith
Hiroshi Sugimoto in the Hayward Gallery with his ‘Opticks’ series
2023

Installation view of Hiroshi Sugimoto, Conceptual Forms 0003 and Mathematical Model 002. Gelatin silver print, aluminium and steel
Photo: Mark Blower. Courtesy the artist and the Hayward Gallery

Installation view of Hiroshi Sugimoto, Conceptual Forms 0003 2004. Gelatin silver print
Photo: Mark Blower. Courtesy the artist and the Hayward Gallery

Hiroshi Sugimoto (Japanese, b. 1948)
Conceptual Forms 0003 Dini’s surface – a surface of constant negative curvature obtained by twisting a pseudosphere
2004
Gelatin silver print
© Hiroshi Sugimoto, courtesy of the artist

Hiroshi Sugimoto (Japanese, b. 1948)
Mathematical Model 002 Dini’s Surface
2005
Aluminium and steel
© Hiroshi Sugimoto, courtesy of the artist

Installation view of Hiroshi Sugimoto, Conceptual Forms and Mathematical Model 006. Gelatin silver print, aluminium and steel
Photo: Mark Blower. Courtesy the artist and the Hayward Gallery

Installation view of Hiroshi Sugimoto, Conceptual Form Surface 0001 Helicoid: Minimal Surface 2004. Gelatin silver print
Photo: Mark Blower. Courtesy the artist and the Hayward Gallery

Hiroshi Sugimoto (Japanese, b. 1948)
Conceptual Form Surface 0001 Helicoid: Minimal Surface
2004
Gelatin silver print
© Hiroshi Sugimoto, courtesy of the artist

Hiroshi Sugimoto
Photo credit: Sugimoto Studio

Hayward Gallery
Southbank Centre, Belvedere Road,
London SE1 8XX

Wed – Fri 10am – 6pm
Sat 10am – 8pm
Sun 10am – 6pm
Closed Monday and Tuesday

Southbank Centre website

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Vale Larry Fink (American, 1941-2023)

December 2023

Larry Fink (American, 1941-2023)
John Sabatine and Molly
1980
Gelatin silver print

“To try to see more and better is not a matter of whim or curiosity or self-indulgence. To see or to perish is the very condition laid upon everything that makes up the universe, by reason of the mysterious gift of existence.”

Teilhard de Chardin, “Seeing” 1947

Being human

Another master photographer has died. We are losing so many important visionaries who were born pre-Second World War, during the war and post-war period.

While I have sequenced this posting to highlight the dichotomy in Fink’s exploration of social class in America, that is, between the haves and the have-nots, between the hedonistic party people of Studio 54, the urban New Yorkers of “high society” and rural, working-class Pennsylvanians1 – as ever in life, Fink’s work is much more complex and nuanced than that.

Fink acknowledged that the photographs in his series “Social Graces” of New York “high society” at play were hard of heart. “I used to judge people out of the hardness of my heart. So, I went into these very voluptuous and elegant bourgeois circumstances, and I would judge these people as if they were the enemy.” That does not make these photographs any less valuable as a record of that brief moment of encounter between photographer and subject. For he observed, “The moment that we have is the only moment we will ever have, insofar as it is fleeting. Every breath counts. So does every moment and perception.”

Thus, in any of his photographs you have to admire his skill at capturing that fleeting moment: marvel at the flying pigtail in Studio 54 (1977, below) and feel the immediacy of hand gesture in Pat Sabatine’s 8th Birthday Party (1977, below) or the contemptuous look on the woman’s face in Pat Sabatine’s 11th Birthday Party (1980, below) to understand that.

In later life Fink – an empathetic human with an inquiring mind who obviously worked on his inner growth, who had acquired knowledge and a little wisdom – was aware how he had wronged himself and others during the taking of the photographs for “Social Graces”.

“When age had given me entry into life’s harder organic experiences – my back, my heart, my prostate, my hip – I started to look at my own face in the mirror and see the results of pain. I would see that many of the judgments I had made in the early days, based on an ideal sense of a physical equilibrium, were absolutely and horrendously bigoted. I was not at all sensitive to either the inner or external trappings of what it means to just be alive and all its various, vulnerable complexities.”2

With every breath he understood that when he took photographs he was attempting to touch the eternal, an expression of admiration and gratitude at being alive.

“I am involved with the idea of reaching deeply into the pulsing matter of what it means to be alive and being vulnerable and seeing if I can cast an emotional legacy about being human.”

The emotional legacy of his photographs attests to his enduring spirit.

Dr Marcus Bunyan

1/ “He paired the tales of these two worlds – the chilly anomie of the haute monde and the lively, messy domesticity of the Sabatines – in a collection of photographs he called “Social Graces,” which was first shown in an exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1979 and then published in a book of the same title in 1984, now considered a collector’s item.”

Penelope Green. “Larry Fink, Whose Photographs Were ‘Political, Not Polemical,’ Dies at 82,” on The New York Times website Nov. 30, 2023 [Online] Cited 02/12/2023

2/ Larry Fink quoted in Adriana Teresa. “A Moment With Larry Fink,” on The New York Times website Jan. 6, 2011 [Online] Cited 02/12/2023

Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.

“The goal, I suspect, through harmonies and edges and everything that we have in our command, is to take a dumb two-dimensional picture and make it something that a viewer enters and doesn’t want to leave.”

Larry Fink

“It’s about empathy. But the necessary methodology is conventionally in-your-face. Not like other practitioners, who are in your face for the sake of being in your face, I am in your face because I want to be your face. I like to say that if I was not a photographer, I would be in jail. I want to touch everything. My life is profoundly physical. Photography for me is the transformation of desire. …

I don’t like to hurt people. I go after something and I start pointing the camera at somebody, looking for those hard, edgy things I know I am going to find. My pictures will be out of bounds in terms of the convention of how this person wants to be represented. It gives me pause. I don’t feel I have the right to do that. But I do it nevertheless. After all, a picture is not a murder. It is simply a moment which suggests so many things. …

I was severely analytical when I was young, like when I was doing “Social Graces.” I was a good-looking kid. My mother was very vain, competitive and judgmental, and I took on the same characteristics as a younger person. I used to judge people out of the hardness of my heart. So, I went into these very voluptuous and elegant bourgeois circumstances, and I would judge these people as if they were the enemy. I believed the work to be analytical, in a political fashion.

When age had given me entry into life’s harder organic experiences – my back, my heart, my prostate, my hip – I started to look at my own face in the mirror and see the results of pain. I would see that many of the judgments I had made in the early days, based on an ideal sense of a physical equilibrium, were absolutely and horrendously bigoted. I was not at all sensitive to either the inner or external trappings of what it means to just be alive and all its various, vulnerable complexities. …

The moment that we have is the only moment we will ever have, insofar as it is fleeting. Every breath counts. So does every moment and perception. It’s a way to be alive. I am involved with the idea of reaching deeply into the pulsing matter of what it means to be alive and being vulnerable and seeing if I can cast an emotional legacy about being human.”

Larry Fink quoted in Adriana Teresa. “A Moment With Larry Fink,” on The New York Times website Jan. 6, 2011 [Online] Cited 02/12/2023

Larry Fink (American, 1941-2023)
Studio 54
1977
Gelatin silver print

Larry Fink was born in Brooklyn in 1941. In the 1960s, he studied with noted photographer Lisette Model. This photograph from Studio 54, made in 1977 in the hedonistic heyday of the disco era, is a well know image from Fink’s series “Social Graces,” which explored social class in America by comparing two different worlds: that of urban New Yorkers of “high society” and that of rural, working-class Pennsylvanians through social events like birthday parties. Fink has described his approach to his subject in a straightforward, non-judgmental manner, “The one thing I was trained in being was non-hierarchical. I don’t have an internal class system. Who you are is who is in front of me and who I am in the same, and that’s how we have to relate to each other.”

Larry Fink (American, 1941-2023)
Pat Sabatine’s 8th Birthday Party
1977
Gelatin silver print

Larry Fink (American, 1941-2023)
Russian Ball, New York City
1976
Gelatin silver print

Larry Fink (American, 1941-2023)
Pat Sabatine’s 11th Birthday Party
1980
Gelatin silver print

Larry Fink (American, 1941-2023)
Benefit, MoMA, New York
1977
Gelatin silver print

Larry Fink, a kinetic photographer whose intimate black-and-white on-the-fly portraits of rural Pennsylvanians, Manhattan society figures, Hollywood royalty, boxers, musicians, fashion models and many others were both social commentary on class and privilege and an exuberant document of the human condition, died on Saturday at his home in Martins Creek, Pa. He was 82. …

… in the early 1970s he turned to overt social commentary, infiltrating the society benefits, debutante parties and watering holes of Manhattan’s privileged tribes and their hangers-on. He was fueled, he once wrote, both by curiosity and by his own rage at the privileged class – “its abuses, voluptuous folds, and unfulfilled lives.”

A few years later, he and his wife at the time, the painter Joan Snyder, moved to a farm in Pennsylvania, where he began photographing his rural neighbors, a charismatic family called the Sabatines who embraced him as one of their own. He went on to capture years’ worth of the family’s baptisms, birthdays and graduations.

He paired the tales of these two worlds — the chilly anomie of the haute monde and the lively, messy domesticity of the Sabatines – in a collection of photographs he called “Social Graces,” which was first shown in an exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1979 and then published in a book of the same title in 1984, now considered a collector’s item.

“Social Graces” placed Mr. Fink firmly in the photographic canon. It drew comparisons to the street photos of Weegee and Diane Arbus and even to the paintings of Caravaggio. (Mr. Fink was a master of shadow and light.) When the pictures were shown in 2001 at the Yancey Richardson gallery in Manhattan’s Chelsea section, Ken Johnson, writing in The New York Times, described them as “wonderfully absorbing, funny, skewed, ethereally glowing documents of human situations.”

Penelope Green. “Larry Fink, Whose Photographs Were ‘Political, Not Polemical,’ Dies at 82,” on The New York Times website Nov. 30, 2023 [Online] Cited 02/12/2023

Larry Fink (American, 1941-2023)
Skating Rink
1980
Gelatin silver print

Larry Fink (American, 1941-2023)
Studio 54, New York City
May 1977
Gelatin silver print

Larry Fink (American, 1941-2023)
Oslin’s Graduation Party
1977
Gelatin silver print

Larry Fink (American, 1941-2023)
N.Y.C. Club Cornich
1977, printed 1983
From the portfolio 82 Photographs 1974 to 1982
Gelatin silver print

Larry Fink (American, 1941-2023)
Melzer Family Picnic, Eastport, Long Island, New York
June 2002
Gelatin silver print

Larry Fink (American, 1941-2023)
Peter Beard’s, East Hampton
1982, printed 1983
From the portfolio 82 Photographs 1974 to 1982
Gelatin silver print

Larry Fink (American, 1941-2023)
Jean Sabatine and Molly
1983
Gelatin silver print

Larry Fink (American, 1941-2023)
Benefit, Corcoran Museum, Washington DC
1975
Gelatin silver print

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Vale Elliott Erwitt (1928-2023)

December 2023

Elliott Erwitt (American born France, 1928-2023)
New York City
1955
Gelatin silver print

The essence of what happens

Elliott Erwitt’s “art of observation” is a gift of the eye and the mind, where the artist must be truly aware of the world around them in order to capture the mosaic of reality.

Look at the photograph Jackie Kennedy, Arlington, Virginia (1963, below). Observe the split second that particular look of despair was present on Jackie’s face. And there was Erwitt fully aware, in the moment, with his gift of the eye and the mind – and he knew, he absolutely knew that was the moment to take the photograph.

As with much of his work it is the subtle cadences within the image that create their emotional power and magic: sadness, happiness, whimsy, comedy, anger, loneliness, joy – all captured through the reality of the visual language of the image, fully acknowledged in the heart and the mind of the viewer when they imbibe (absorb the ideas) of their spirit.

Dr Marcus Bunyan

Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.

“You either see, or you don’t see.”

Elliott Erwitt

“The work I care about is terribly simple … I observe, I try to entertain, but above all I want pictures that are emotion.”

Elliott Erwitt. Personal Exposures. W. W. Norton & Company, 1988

“You can take a picture of the most wonderful situation and it’s lifeless, nothing comes through… Then you can take a picture of nothing, of someone scratching his nose, and it turns out to be a great picture.”

Elliott Erwitt

“The whole point of taking pictures is so that you don’t have to explain things with words. To me, photography is an art of observation. It’s about finding something interesting in an ordinary place… I’ve found it has little to do with the things you see and everything to do with the way you see them.”

Elliott Erwitt

“All the technique in the world doesn’t compensate for the inability to notice.”

Elliott Erwitt

Elliott Erwitt (American born France, 1928-2023)
Pasadena, California, USA
Nd
Gelatin silver print

Elliott Erwitt (American born France, 1928-2023)
USA. California. Berkeley
1956
Gelatin silver print

Photographers with a comic outlook on life seldom win the acclaim granted to exalters of nature or chroniclers of war and squalor. Elliott Erwitt, who died at 95 on Wednesday at his home in Manhattan, was an exception.

For more than six decades he used his camera to tell visual jokes, finding material wherever he strolled. His sharp eye for silly, sometimes telling conjunctions – a dog lying on its back in a cemetery, a glowing Coca-Cola machine amid a public display of missiles in Alabama, a mangy potted plant in a tacky Miami Beach ballroom – earned him constant assignments as well as the affection of a public that shared his sweet, Chaplin-esque sense of the absurd.

Richard B. Woodward. “Elliott Erwitt, Whose Photos Are Famous, and Often Funny, Dies at 95,” on The New York Times website Nov. 30, 2023 [Online] Cited 03/12/2023

Elliott Erwitt (American born France, 1928-2023)
USA. New York, New York
1953
Gelatin silver print

Elliott Erwitt (American born France, 1928-2023)
Felix, Gladys and Rover (New York, USA)
New York City, 1974
Gelatin silver print

Elliott Erwitt (American born France, 1928-2023)
Moscow, USSR
1959
Gelatin silver print

Elliott Erwitt (American born France, 1928-2023)
Jackie Kennedy, Arlington, Virginia
1963
Gelatin silver print

Elliott Erwitt (American born France, 1928-2023)
Wilmington, North Carolina
1950
Gelatin silver print

Elliott Erwitt (American born France, 1928-2023)
Paris, France
1989
Gelatin silver print

Elliott Erwitt (American born France, 1928-2023)
USA. New York City
1988
Gelatin silver print

Elliott Erwitt (American born France, 1928-2023)
Pittsburgh, USA
1950
Gelatin silver print

Elliott Erwitt (American born France, 1928-2023)
Brazil. Buzios
1990
Gelatin silver print

Elliott Erwitt (American born France, 1928-2023)
Guanajuato, Mexico
1957
Gelatin silver print

Elliott Erwitt (American born France, 1928-2023)
France, Paris, Lucienne Van Kan
1952
Gelatin silver print

Elliott Erwitt (American born France, 1928-2023)
Fort Dix, USA
1951
Gelatin silver print

Elliott Erwitt (American born France, 1928-2023)
Bakersfield, USA
1983
Gelatin silver print

Elliott Erwitt (American born France, 1928-2023)
Bal, Paris, France
1967
Gelatin silver print

Elliott Erwitt (American born France, 1928-2023)
Spain, Valencia
1952
Gelatin silver print

Elliott Erwitt (American born France, 1928-2023)
Huntsville, Alabama
1974
Gelatin silver print

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Vale Ian Lobb (1948-2023), photographer

December 2023

Marcus Bunyan (Australian, b. 1958)
Ian Lobb, Station Street, Fairfield
5 October 2022

The luminosity of Ian Lobb

These words are a celebration of the life of an extraordinary human, a heartfelt stream of consciousness text that touches on aspects of the life of Ian Lobb, photographer.

Ian Lobb was my friend. He was a poet, photographer, raconteur. He my first photographer lecturer at university who I could always rely on for advice on art, photography, writing and life. He was an audiophile and a lover of music, anything from classical to jazz to Nina Simone, Paul McCartney and Bob Dylan. He was a lover of women. He was dreamer and a philosopher. He adored the American artist Cy Twombly. He was a rabid Sydney Swans fan!

In the early 1990s monthly reviews of student photographic work at Phillip Institute of Technology (PIT, which later became part of RMIT University) with Ian and fellow lecturer Les Walkling were electric. Ideas and passion for the work abounded, discussions ran for hours on how to create work – with feeling and insight into the condition of image (and human) becoming. Here Ian introduced me to Tarkovsky, Eisenstein and Joseph Campbell, and the Marathon Monks of Mount Hiei, Kyoto, Japan. And of course he introduced me to the French photographer Eugène Atget – oh how we loved Atget, and Strand, Weston, Caponigro and Minor White. We could talk on any subject. Many years later, at our regular coffee catchups in Fairfield, I would take him new photography books that I had bought and recent object d’art purchases and, over lunch, the conversation would range far and wide about photography, art and life. He helped me sequence my work – have you thought about this pairing together, what about swapping this one over – and we drew inspiration from the sequences of Minor White and his use of “ice/fire”.

Ian was a storyteller. His photographs tell stories. From the teachings of Minor White (especially his “Three Canons”) there was an acknowledgement in his work of the spirit of the object he was photographing – a moment of revelation sought in the negative and subsequent print through a connection and circular transmission of energy between artist and object back through the camera and onto film (Zen)(for example see Eagles Nest, Cape Paterson 1975, below). A moment of revelation of spirit that was so important to Ian that this moment of “revelatio” can still be seen and felt in his recent mobile phone images.

Ian was aware, fully present. He was attuned to his surroundings like few people I have met for he was tremendously attentive, tremendously awake and sensitive to the environment and the vibrations of energy that emanated from the city, the land, the sky. Imagine travelling to a small patch of earth in the Black Ranges year after year to photograph in all seasons and in all weather something that he could see and feel in that land… something any other human would not even recognise, would walk past without a moments hesitation as though nothing was there, was of no import. But not Ian. He recognised and felt the energy of that place, space.

Talking to the wonderful Australian photographer David Tatnall who was also a friend of Ian’s we reminisced the other day. Ian had won an Australia Council grant and went to America on board a cargo ship teaching yoga on the way over, first going to South America and then on to America. There he visited Barbara, Wynn Bullock’s wife, and Ralph Gibson, Brett Weston, Harry Callahan and William Clift. He attended workshops with Ansel Adams and Paul Caponigro. He visited the Museum of Modern Art’s reading room and examined box after box of iconic prints by the masters, all jumbled together as he told me in folders with little order or care for their preservation. David told me he rocked up unannounced at Eliot Porter’s and said he was a visiting photographer from Australia, and while Eliot made a pot of tea he was left to go through boxes of dye transfer prints. Back then there was a camaraderie of photography very different from the present. Can you imagine doing that today!

He conversed with the masters. Like a pebble making ripples in a pond the energy of these photographers was transferred by osmosis through Ian to a wider network of artists. David and I remembered how Ian taught us to look at the print upside down in order to understand the balance of the print and develop an appreciation of its structure and the music inherent in it. Look at the image of Caponigro’s Reflecting Stream, Redding, CT (1968, below) – one of Ian’s favourites – and you just know that water has to be “wet” in that print, that the shadows of the trees on the water have to be (Ansel Adams) Zone 2, and that the Zone 7 patch of grey under the boulder in the centre of the image is critical to its music, its balance. Ian knew these things instinctively, intuitively. Ian also taught both of us how to make Ansel Adams’ “burning in” tool… three pieces of stiff black board (with the top two pieces secured by tape to make a hinges) with gradually larger holes in each board for use under the enlarger, so that you could easily flip the boards to a larger or smaller hole for “burning in” while making a print. We both still have these indispensable tools, passed down like an oral history from the master. On reflection, learning from Ian and Les during those early days printing black and white photographs in the basement darkroom at Phillip Institute of Technology (PIT) in Bundoora, Melbourne were some of the happiest days of my life.

With friend and fellow director William (Bill) Heimerman (1950-2017), The Photographers’ Gallery and Workshop, Melbourne brought to Australia some of the most respected master photographers from around the world: Wynn Bullock, Emmet Gowin, Eikoh Hosoe, William Clift, Harry Callahan, Paul Caponigro, William Eggleston, Ralph Gibson, Duane Michaels, Lisette Model, August Sander, Aaron Siskind among others … and promoted local Australian photographers such as John Cato, Carol Jerrems, Christopher Koller, Jeff Busby and more. I was privileged to have several solo exhibitions in the gallery space. For the opening of Carol Jerrems exhibition at the gallery, Ian asked her who she would most like to attend – and Carol said Ron Barassi, then the most popular sporting and cultural personality in Australia. And on the day of the opening who attended – the great man himself. I don’t know how Ian did it, but he did!

David Tatnall took Ian to Cape Paterson only a couple of weeks before his passing, the first time he had been there since his father’s death many years ago (see the photographs below). Ian took some photographs with camera on tripod and on the mobile phone and then sat down, sat down and just looked at things in that self deprecating way of his. He just looked at the rocks and the form and the light and soaked in the spirit of the place. The same with his favourite tree, his beloved lemon scented gum in the garden of his church in Fairfield. Much as the Black Range series many years earlier, he took thousands of photographs on his mobile phone of this tree in all weather conditions, at all times of the day and year. He saw and felt something there that he kept coming back too, searching for the answer to that one great question that he could never answer.

David said that he believed that he was only using the mobile phone as a visual notebook before he came back to the place to photograph with an SLR – but respectfully I must disagree. Increasingly in his later years Ian surrendered the use of his bigger digital cameras to the flexibility of his mobile phone camera, trading in their heft for the felt immediacy of the mobile phone image and his ability to study the results as he pleased. While many would dismiss these phones images as preludes to the finished work, Ian recognised (as do many artists) that these impressions, these deeply felt visual sketches, had become fully rendered works of art. He moved with the times. As he observed, “For the last 18 months I’ve been spending the first few hours of the day in the local church yard where I am photographing a lemon scented gum. I’m doing this with an iPhone as a way of exploring different ways of working that facilitates.” (Email for William Clift sent to Marcus Bunyan 22 January 2023)

Ian loved telling a story. And he was passionate about the Sydney Swans. He regaled me with the story of how he was so incensed by seeing photographers inside the circle of players celebrating in the rooms after a victory that he wrote to the club to explain that this space, this inner sanctum of celebration, should be a “sacred space” as he put it just for the players… and that photographers should not be allowed in to that space, but only be able to look in from the outside. He was special like that. He understood the significance of that circle and the energy that flowed across the space as players linked arms and belted out the club song. Nothing should disturb the sanctity of that space, much as nothing should disturb the energy of a rock face.

Ian was a (com)passionate man. He was a spiritual man. Throughout his life he had a deep abiding faith in Jesus and the benevolence and goodness of the Almighty. Now he is be gone but his energy still surrounds us. In his beloved lemon scented gum and in the many memorable ideas and images he shared with us.

Ian Lobb was my friend. I will miss his wise counsel.

God bless him xx

Dr Marcus Bunyan

PS. A very interesting analysis by Gary Sauer-Thompson on Ian Lobb’s Black Range series and new concepts in contemporary landscape photography can be found in the article “Ian Lobb + contemporary landscape photography” on the Thought Factory website January 28, 2024. Recommended reading.

Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image. Many thankx to David Tatnall for allowing me to publish his images that are included in this posting.

“If you think of all the wonderful experiences of making images – and then sequencing them – really it is top of the world experience. If this then happens when society is particularly in flux – on spiritual and identity issues, and sequencing happens by someone who is sensitive to the time and the issues. And is sensitive to “image”. Then you really really hope that the book is well produced.”

Ian Lobb email to Marcus Bunyan, 29 May 2015

“In “LA Confidential” they give away their source by using the word “valediction”. A good name for a poem, maybe the best, but not an exhausted idea. Look out I have been inspired by genius. People say that they have to do something more difficult than they need. That’s ok. – there are angels to prevent that – but if you don’t want to go that way, most of them aren’t against us.”

Ian Lobb text to Marcus Bunyan, Monday 11 September 2023

“Marcus – can we be told how to love ? The first thought is no – but I’m not going to rush into an answer. Can we be told how to love a photograph or which photographs to love? I do know that my walk this morning has been recalling which photographs I have loved – and stopping on those where I have not lately dwelt. I didn’t get past the Paul Strand of the white picket fence. Sitting now on Station st as the coffee shops carry out their tables and seeing it.”

Ian Lobb text to Marcus Bunyan, Saturday, 16 September 2023

Ian Lobb speaking at a celebration of the life of William (Bill) Heimerman (1950-2017)

Windsor, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, October 21, 2017.
Thank you to Peter Leiss for allowing me to publish this video.

Paul Strand (American, 1890 – 1976)
White Fence, Port Kent, New York
1916 (negative); 1945 (print)
Gelatin silver print

Paul Caponigro (American, b. 1932)
Reflecting Stream, Redding, CT
1968
Gelatin silver print

During this particular workshop Caponigro was sometimes in a room where he could display several prints at once – he would never take them all down after talking, but move the first images away and attach new images to the right as he talked. The workshop was with the senior students of an Oregon art school, it can be dated because it was during the impeachment of Nixon.

~ Ian Lobb email to Marcus Bunyan, 6 January 2015

Minor White (American, 1908-1976)
Point Lobos, California
1948
Gelatin silver print

Marcus, have you been to Point Lobos? I think you would find it a big experience if you were there at a quiet time. Imagine Minor White going to visit Weston on Wildcat Hill, and then the short drive down to Point Lobos – there would be some frisson in that car!! It’s not quite Nietzsche going to visit Wagner – but it’s not bad. For a lot of the year the day starts with fog and then the fog pulls back a little offshore and then comes back again. I think Weston’s Pelican would have been photographed in fog.

~ Ian Lobb email to Marcus Bunyan, 29 May 2015

Ansel Adams (American, 1902-1984)
Merced River, Cliffs, Autumn
1939
Gelatin silver print

When talking to him [Ansel Adams] you can imagine the number of mediocre questions. While I was listening all of his answers were quotes from his books. There had to be an extraordinary move to get him to break ranks with this rule.

~ Ian Lobb text to Marcus Bunyan, Sunday, 5 March 2023

Black Range series

Ian Lobb (Australian, 1948-2023)
Untitled
1989
from the Black Range series 1986-1989
36.9 × 36.7cm (image)
National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
Purchased with funds donated by Hallmark Cards Australia Pty Ltd, 1989
© Ian Lobb

Ian Lobb (Australian, 1948-2023)
Untitled
1989
from the Black Range series 1986-1989
35.6 × 35.6cm (image)
National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
Purchased with funds donated by Hallmark Cards Australia Pty Ltd, 1989
© Ian Lobb

Ian Lobb (Australian, 1948-2023)
Untitled
1986, printed 1989
from the Black Range series 1986-1989
26.4 × 26.4cm (image)
National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
Purchased with funds donated by Hallmark Cards Australia Pty Ltd, 1989
© Ian Lobb

Ian Lobb (Australian, 1948-2023)
Untitled
1989
from the Black Range series 1986-1989
36.5 × 36.5cm (image)
National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
Purchased with funds donated by Hallmark Cards Australia Pty Ltd, 1989
© Ian Lobb

Ian Lobb (Australian, 1948-2023)
No title (Soft focus landscape with branch detail in foreground)
1989, printed 1998
from the Black Range series 1986-1989
38.2 × 38.4cm (image)
National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
Presented through The Art Foundation of Victoria by the artist, Fellow, 2000
© Ian Lobb

The Photographers’ Gallery and Workshop

Peter Leiss (Australian, b. 1951)
Untitled [Bill Heimerman and Ian Lobb at the rear of the Photographers’ Gallery]
c. 1975-1980
Gelatin silver print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Untitled [Atget’s Work Room with Contact Printing Frames]
c. 1910

I am very familiar with the old suitcases under the desk – I think that only one – if any – is a suitcase.

This is typically how an exhibition would arrive at the Photographers’ Gallery – it would hold about 40 matted prints. Undo the strap and open the box to typically find 2 or 3 brown paper parcels. Maybe some archival tissue on the next layer down = sometimes not = and then about 20 mounted and matted prints sometimes face to face. This is the way Caponigro for example sent his prints – I’m trying to remember William Clift – Maybe one box like that and a handmade bigger one – or maybe 2 wooden boxes = but at least half the exhibitions arrived in boxes like that.

But have a look to the left of those boxes –what are they? They look like old fashioned double-darks – maybe for a quarter plate camera. The distance from the emulsion to the edge of the case was different for these compared to the last generation 5×4 double darks. People sometimes tried to make a way of putting the old film carriers onto 5×4″ cameras – but they would be focussing on the wrong spot by not making adjustments for the different positions of the emulsion.

To return to the boxes – they would be waiting for us at the airport, and we would have to spin a yarn to the customs agents telling them that the prints were for “educational purposes only”. It was a great educational experience to unwrap some of the prints when they came with a piece of tissue paper between the print and the mat – you could see something of the image and then get to imagine it before removing the tissue.

Re Robert Frank – also note the size of the Lupe next to his hand. Ralph Gibson had Robert Franks Leica enlarger – For some reason it was in his “living room” – I have seen it!!!

~ Ian Lobb email to Marcus Bunyan 1 December, 2015

Carol Jerrems (Australian, 1949-1980)
Untitled [Bill Heimerman and Ian Lobb at the Dog Rocks near Geelong]
c. 1975-1980
Gelatin silver print

Cape Liptrap and Cape Paterson

Ian Lobb (Australian, 1948-2023)
Ocean (Cape Liptrap)
1979
Gelatin silver photograph
17.3 × 22.5cm
National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
Purchased, 1980
© Ian Lobb

Ian Lobb (Australian, 1948-2023)
No title (Black sand and rocks)
1989; printed 1992
Gelatin silver photograph
34.3 × 34.3cm (image)
National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
Presented through The Art Foundation of Victoria by the artist, Fellow, 2000
© Ian Lobb

Ian Lobb (Australian, 1948-2023)
Eagles Nest, Cape Paterson
1975; printed 1979
Gelatin silver photograph
17.6 × 17.4cm (image)
National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
Purchased, 1980
© Ian Lobb

David Tatnall (Australian, b. 1955)
Ian at Eagles Nest, Cape Paterson
November 2023

This was the first Ian time had returned to Cape Paterson since the death of his father many years ago.

David Tatnall (Australian, b. 1955)
Ian at Eagles Nest, Cape Paterson
November 2023

Lemon scented gum, Fairfield

Marcus Bunyan (Australian, b. 1958)
Ian Lobb, Fairfield
December 2021

Maxwell Allara (American, born Italy, 1906-1981)
Untitled (Minor White During a Workshop)
1959
Gelatin silver print

David Tatnall (Australian, b. 1955)
Ian in front of his favourite tree, Fairfield
November 2021

Minor White (American, 1908-1976)
Moencopi Strata, Capital Reef, Utah
1962
Gelatin silver print

Ian Lobb (Australian, 1948-2023)
Lemon scented gum
24 January 2023

Ian Lobb (Australian, 1948-2023)
Lemon scented gum
14 February 2023

“The light comes down the tree. But for some days it twists right to left and makes an early morning shadow.

~ Ian Lobb text to Marcus Bunyan, Monday 11 September 2023

Ian Lobb (Australian, 1948-2023)
Lemon scented gum
22 February 2023

Ian Lobb (Australian, 1948-2023)
Lemon scented gum
8 March 2023

Marcus – thanks for the mystic particles. After I have apple and rhubarb I’ll be walking to check on the tree in the church-garden. I’m interested in this, rather than my own garden. Who knows why I can’t photograph my own. Do you have a garden close by that you can walk through easily? I can’t wait for the sun to move a bit further and the light to come back on church gum. A few weeks.

~ Ian Lobb text to Marcus Bunyan, Wednesday 12 July 2023

Ian Lobb (Australian, 1948-2023)
Lemon scented gum
13 September 2023

Mobile phone photographs

Ian Lobb (Australian, 1948-2023)
Untitled (Green woman)
22 November 2022

Ian Lobb (Australian, 1948-2023)
Alex
21 December 2022

Ian Lobb (Australian, 1948-2023)
Untitled (pink and black)
31 January 2023

Ian Lobb (Australian, 1948-2023)
The path from the coffee shop
Fairfield, 4 February 2023

Ian Lobb (Australian, 1948-2023)
The path to the coffee shop
Fairfield, 4 February 2023

Ian Lobb (Australian, 1948-2023)
Building his ying, Ignoring his yang
21 February 2023

The First One

First one through the forest
First one on the beach
First one through the shallows
First one in the deep
Yes, first in the water
To swim out of reach
First one to belong
And then to be gone
First one to be gone too soon.

First foot off the platform
First step off the map
First one to learn
With nothing to teach
First one in this life
To whisper my name.
First one through my shallows
First one in my deep
First one to be gone too soon.

First winter field night
When the fires are lit
First soul at midnight
Watching burning trees twist.
At your back is the darkness
That turns you to see …
First one to the shadows
First one to the deep
First one to be gone too soon.

There’s a sound that’s so big
We can’t even hear
Not a murmur, a pulse
A note, nor a song
After midnight it wakes you
To its echoes and trace
First one to be swallowed
First one in the deep
First one to be gone too soon.

You’re the first, yes its true
On the roll call of friends
Now there’s spaces, not names
And you: you’re the worst.
You’re a very faint glow
On a very faint path
You were first through the shallows
First one in the deep
First one to be gone too soon.

Ian Lobb 28 August 2018

Ian Lobb (Australian, 1948-2023)
A small moment with…
25 February 2023

“If only the lens didn’t have anti flare – it would have been an Atget moment.”

~ Ian Lobb

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Saint-Cloud
1926
Albumen print

Ian Lobb (Australian, 1948-2023)
Billiard
2 March 2023

Ian: Please see full screen for pleasing puns

Marcus: Love how the graffiti imitates the shape of the wood in the trolley and how the triangle of white dots is a metaphor for the billiard triangle used to rack up the balls

Ian: Yes. And with the billiard signage I thought it was like a players gesture – towards the corner pocket

~ Ian Lobb text to Marcus Bunyan, Friday, 3 March 2023

Ian Lobb (Australian, 1948-2023)
Untitled (Mother)
30 April 2023

Apart from the teenagers at church, the mention that you were talking to your mother, was one of the few mentions of that relationship since my mother had passed. One minute after that I took this on my way home.

~ Ian Lobb text to Marcus Bunyan, Sunday, 30 April 2023

Ian Lobb (Australian, 1948-2023)
Untitled (black oblong)
Fairfield, 8 May 2023

Ian Lobb (Australian, 1948-2023)
Untitled (My walk this morning)
Fairfield, 11 May 2023

On my second roll of HP4 were pictures of a young lady lying under clear sheets of curved 2mm plastic that I had sprayed with water (1968?). The attached is from my walk this morning. The similar mood is quite scary.

~ Ian Lobb text to Marcus Bunyan, Thursday, 11 May 2023

Ian Lobb (Australian, 1948-2023)
mmmm, Pasta Poetry
Fairfield, 21 June 2023

Thinking about John Cato this morning. If you can google “the world is too much with us” – Wordsworth – and give a toast to John. Proteus!!!

~ Ian Lobb text to Marcus Bunyan, Wednesday, 5 July 2023

The world is too much with us

The world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;–
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!
This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon;
The winds that will be howling at all hours,
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers;
For this, for everything, we are out of tune;
It moves us not. Great God! I’d rather be
A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;
Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea;
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathèd horn.
William Wordsworth 1802

Cy Twombly (American, 1928-2011)
Coronation of Sesostris (Part III)
2000

Affirmation: When you Sing

(An affirmation from Cy Twombly’s Coronation of Sesostris)

If you sing, don’t let them hesitate
When you sing, don’t let them make signs of regret
When you sing, let them bear the loss of silence
When you sing, the lost gods are found
When you sing, the birds and trees love their shadows
Lying quietly on the ground
When you sing, the mark of nature and the mark of the mark rejoice
When you sing we trace to the source of trace – the realm.

Sing to the ghosts, sing to those to come
Flow over – into – flow over
Let the trees rise from the earth because you sing:
New sunlight on new leaves cutting into space
Write your name
with their scintilla through the air as you sing
Then each letter narrows, fades white
Still unending trace as sing and sing as a lost god.
One majesty fades to another
Sing Osiris , sing that god into Orpheus

scribes
Porous sparse voice, could have been scattered
Empty surface – instead open sky
Bell
Nothing to shatter
Sing for the old rivers,
Sailors sink into sails,
The opposite bank still opposite
Take this – sing – most important , to the next life.
Like tall trees, rising from …

Gods cannot depart while love, I mean song, remains
Gods have not departed: it would have been heeded,
Reported as a hoax,
No arc of departure divulged
song, weightless
Gods have not departed – it is a drunken hoax, rumour.

Ian Lobb 30 August 2018

Cy Twombly (American, 1928-2011)
Coronation of Sesostris (Part V)
2000

Cy Twombly (American, 1928-2011)
Coronation of Sesostris (Part VI)
2000

Last house

Are you travelling to this very last house
On the very last street of this town?
That I built here for you,
Where I wait for you
If you go round the back you’ll find wild flowers
That you could almost touch
And you would watch the clouds come down from the hills

Long ago I promised this to you
It became my story that you’d come
To the last street
And to the last house
I watch all the doors to see you enter
So that we would almost touch
And you could watch the rain come down from the hills

Yes, it’s true, the house backs onto darkness
I swear there’s really nothing out there
Beyond this last street
Beyond this last house
Nothing you could be sure to name
Nothing we can almost touch
And at night you could keep watch, from here to the hills

You can smell salt in the air from all of the rooms
And hear the wind in the waves
But out the back you’ll only find wildflowers.
Not those grey choppy waves
That we can almost touch
On this last street
In this last house.

Ian Lobb 29 August 2018

Flickerd (Australian)
Zac Foot of Sydney during the 2019 NEAFL round 14 match between NT Thunder and Sydney at TIO Stadium on Saturday, 6 July 2019 in Darwin, Northern Territory
2019
Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International

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Exhibition: ‘1,001 Remarkable Objects’ at Powerhouse Ultimo, Sydney

Exhibition dates: 26th August – 31st December 2023

Curatorium: Leo Schofield AM (curatorium chair), Ronan Sulich (advisor), Mark Sutcliffe (advisor) and Eva Czernis-Ryl (Powerhouse)
Assistant curator: Chloe Appleby (Powerhouse)
Exhibition manager: Anna Gardner (Powerhouse)
Exhibition coordinator: Kerrie Goodwin (Powerhouse)
Exhibition designers: Pip Runciman, Julie Lynch and Ross Wallace
Lighting Designer: Damien Cooper

Wedgwood & Bentley (English, manufacturer)
Venus
Early 1800s
Black basalt, stoneware
Height: 350 mm
Width: 210 mm
Depth: 150 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased 1949

Many rooms of wonder

What a visual feast we have for you this week!

Being an inveterate collector of eclectic objects who then puts them together in disparate but sympathetic arrangements (as in a Wunderkammer or ‘Cabinet of Curiosities’), the exhibition 1,001 Remarkable Objects at Powerhouse Ultimo, Sydney was a natural for me to post on.

“… the idea of a Wunderkammer was fully born in the sixteenth century as the princely courts of Europe became less peripatetic and as humanist philosophy spread. It was no longer enough simply to show off one’s wealth; every object should also enhance the virtues of the prince. In Inscriptiones vel tituli theatre amplissimi (1565), Samuel Quiccheberg detailed the ideal formula for the Wunderkammer as including naturalia (items created by the earth and items drawn from nature), mirabilia (unusual natural phenomena), artificialia (items wrought by man), ethnographica (items from the wider world), scientifica (items that brought a great understanding of the universe) and artefacta (items relating to history). Together these works would bring the wider world into the court and provide an understanding of the entire universe.”1

While Wunderkammer were the playthings of princes they brought to wider attention the miracles of the universe both natural and manmade. They made human beings aware of the enormity of the forces of nature and (human) industry that surrounded them … through the history and memory of objects.

John McDonald observes every piece has a story. But it is only through (in my case as a collector) being in the presence of these objects and physically handling them that we begin to understand the difference between one piece of Chinese bronze and another, one from the Ming dynasty and another from the Qing dynasty… and the difference in feeling between the two in terms of quality, casting, detail, aesthetics, form. Only through the physical handling of objects do we begin to understand the difference between an original and a fake, how old they are, how they were constructed, what their patina means, and what aura and power the object possesses. I have several pieces of treen (carved wood) in my collection and through the act of holding these objects I wonder about their history. The process is as much a tactile experience as it is a visual one.

The exhibition curators know their art. It is with great pleasure that I observe in an installation photograph in this posting the conflation of two objects that form what Minor White would call “ice/fire” where two disparate objects play off of each other: in this case a vase by that most famous and radical 19th century British designer Sir Christopher Dresser paired with a plate by the equally radical 20th century Russian designer El Lissitzky. A match made in heaven that plays out across the decades, repeated in numerous quirky juxtapositions and inspired nexus throughout the exhibition.

What further sets this exhibition off for me if the absolutely gorgeous and sympathetic “theatrical environments for these whimsical-but-rational groupings.” Exhibition designers Pip Runciman, Julie Lynch and Ross Wallace evoke a visually ravishing atmosphere in which the exhibition flâneur/flâneuse can stroll and take in the sights. Compare this stunning installation to the execrable rooting of the June 2023 Melbourne Winter Masterpieces exhibition Pierre Bonnard at the National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne which presented the iridescent paintings of Bonnard within immersive scenography by Paris-based designer India Mahdavi. Here the work of Pierre Bonnard (which was supposed to be the subject of the exhibition not its addendum) was almost completely overwhelmed by the manic graphic design background of the installation. “Immersive scenography” = art speak for a load of no/sense.

Let the objects speak to us directly or not at all.

Dr Marcus Bunyan

1/ Anonymous. “Wunderkammer: Cabinet of Curiosities,” on the Royal Collection Trust website Nd [Online] Cited 01/12/2023

Many thankx to the Powerhouse Ultimo for allowing me to publish the photographs in the posting. Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.

“Every piece in this show has a story, but they are best sampled first-hand. Curatorially, 1,001 Remarkable Objects is a cultural pot-pourri, with disparate items clustered together based on a shared motif or theme. In some rooms, it’s as if Schofield, along with Mark Sutcliffe, Ronan Sulich and Eva Czernis-Ryl, simply put a word such as “peacock” or “music” into the collection database and selected the strangest things that popped up.

Ephemeral items of pop culture are juxtaposed with artefacts of ancient civilisations, tiny pieces of jewellery are linked with great clunking pieces of furniture. Viewers see everything from an Arnott’s biscuit to an electric car manufactured in Detroit in 1917. One extraordinary pairing puts a medieval suit of armour alongside the wheel of the plane in which Charles Kingsford-Smith perished when he crashed in November 1935.

The effect is almost hallucinogenic, and here one needs to give credit to exhibition designers Pip Runciman, Julie Lynch and Ross Wallace, who have created appropriately theatrical environments for these whimsical-but-rational groupings.

This approach, so contrary to the usual curatorial processes, harks back to the ancestor of the modern museum: the Wunderkammer, or cabinet of curiosities, in which royal courts and wealthy connoisseurs in the 17th and 18th centuries would display historical treasures, works of art, items of natural history and ingenious mechanisms.

John McDonald. “An irresistible, mind-boggling exhibition awakens sense of wonder,” on The Sydney Morning Herald website November 11, 2023 [Online] Cited 12/11/2023

Johann Joachim Kändler (modeller)
Royal Saxon Porcelain Manufactory (manufacturer, Meissen, Germany)
Portrait bust, ‘Baron Schmiedel’
1739
Hard-paste porcelain
Height: 475 mm
Width: 360 mm
Depth: 260 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased 1951

Baron Schmiedel bust by Joachim Kändler

The satirical portrait bust of the court jester Johann Gottfried Tuscheer (born as Johann Gottfried Graf), better known as Baron Schmiedel or Postmaster Schmiedel, was one of the last royal commissions for the Japanese Palace of Augustus the Strong, King of Poland (ruled 1694-1733) and Elector of Saxony. The Japanese Palace was a lavish structure in Dresden refurbished to house both the fabulous royal collection of East Asian porcelains and the amazing new products of the Royal Saxon Porcelain Manufactory in Meissen near Dresden in Germany. Established in 1710, following re-discovery of secret Chinese porcelain formula by the King’s imprisoned alchemist Johann Joachim Böttger, Meissen was Europe’s first factory to make true or hard-paste porcelain. By the mid 1730s, the factory had been able to make monumental animal sculptures, apostle figures and even architectural elements alongside their exquisitely painted vases and tableware.

The bust was modelled by Johann Joachim Kändler (1706-75), the court ‘Modellmeister’ (master modeller) who worked at the Meissen manufactory from 1731 until his death in 1775. The bust was ordered by Augustus III, Augustus the Strong’s son and successor. The medallion on Schmiedel’s chest is based on one of Augustus’ coronation medals.

A highly talented individual who delighted in dressing in the latest fashions, Schmiedel was one of two most prominent jesters at the Saxon court at the time. His role as a jester involved attending the kings in their dressing rooms, at dinners and even at the most intimate court gatherings. He kept company with the kings on visits and hunting expeditions, always ready to crack a joke, exchange witty badinage or play magic tricks with mice while pretending to have morbid fear of rodents. Schmiedel was rewarded with numerous ‘titles’ and valuable presents including Meissen porcelain.

The Schmiedel bust was discovered in Sydney in 1949 by the noted Sydney antique dealer William Bradshaw at a time when its importance and history had been long forgotten. It was acquired by the Museum in 1951. One of the most important objects in the Powerhouse Museum’s collection of ceramics, it is one of only four surviving the the world.

Eva Czernis-Ryl, Curator

For full story see: E. Czernis-Ryl, ‘The golden years of Meissen porcelain and Saxon jesters: the Schmiedel bust in Australia’, Keramik-Freunde der Schweiz (Bulletin des Amis Suisses de la Ceramique), Mitteilungsblatt nr 104, October 1989, pp. 5-11

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Installation view of the exhibition 1,001 Remarkable Objects at Powerhouse Ultimo, Sydney showing at top, El Lissitzky’s Plate (c. 1923, below); and at bottom, Christopher Dresser’s Vase (c. 1888, below)

Lazar Markovich Lissitzky (El Lissitzky, Russian, 1890-1941)(designer and maker, Germany)
Plate (installation view)
c. 1923
Unglazed, earthenware
Depth: 26 mm
Diameter: 190 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased 2002

Plate by Lazar Markovich Lissitzky

A round plate made of heavy unglazed earthenware. Decorated in red enamel, sprayed in a stencil like manner (schablonendecor), with geometric motifs along the rim. Three red circles of differing sizes decorate one side of the plate. Two red curved rectangular bands, one short and one long, decorate the other side of the plate. The text ‘Z 2864’ is impressed on the base of the plate.

An architect and graphic designer, El Lissitzky (1890-1941) was among the most important Russian artists to influence Modernism and one of the great avant-garde figures of the 20th century.

His lifetime involvement with abstract art began in 1919 soon after he met the Suprematist artist Kazimir Malevich (see the ‘Design’ section for a summary of his artistic development and achievements). Between December 1921 and January 1924 he lived and worked in Germany and in 1924 was being treated for tuberculosis in Switzerland. Although initially reluctant to apply his distinctive pictorial vocabulary to utilitarian objects, it is during that time that his abstract pictures known as Prouns began to inform Lissitzky’s designs for a group of ceramics. Soon Prouns were also to become the source of his typography, photography and book, furniture and poster design.

This boldly coloured plate is one of the relatively rare examples of Lissitzky’s ceramics. Examples of plates for the same series comprising plates of different sizes can be found in the Sammlung Ludewig in Berlin, National Museum in Nuremberg, Deutsches Museum in Munich, Australian National Gallery in Canberra and in other collections.

Eva Czernis-Ryl, Curator, 2003

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Christopher Dresser (designer, British, 1834-1906)
Linthorpe Pottery (manufacturer, Middlesbrough, Yorkshire, England)
Vase (installation view)
c. 1888
Earthenware
Powerhouse Collection
Gift of Bob Meyer under the Tax Incentives for the Arts Scheme, 1997

As opposed to John Ruskin and William Morris, Christopher Dresser was an enthusiastic advocate of scientific progress and the machine. The association of simplicity with progress led him to reject the taste for rich decoration of 19th century historical styles and Naturalism which used representational decoration and high-relief ornaments indiscriminately applied to objects. Dresser’s interest in forms based on the structure of plants, his emphasis on function in design and the economic use of materials such as electroplated silver, have no precedent in Western design traditions.The restrained design of this striking vase is a fine example of Dresser’s innovative pottery produced by the Linthrope Pottery.

Eva Czernis-Ryl. Curator

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Carlo Scarpa for VSM Paolo Venini & Co (Murano, Venice, Italy)
Carlo Scarpa (designer, Italian, 1906-1978)
Bowl
c. 1940
Murrine opache
Height: 60 mm
Width: 232 mm
Depth: 365 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased 1984

Before Carlo Scarpa began designing some of Italy’s most celebrated modernist buildings, he spent 15 years with Venini, pushing the boundaries of Venetian glassblowing techniques. He worked for Venini between 1932 and 1947, both pioneering new techniques and reviving traditional Veentian techniques. Franco Deboni, observes: ‘Scarpa’s glass was so radical and innovative for its time. You can see it in the colours, shapes, textures and quality of execution…When you start to analyse the glass, you also realise how extremely complex it was for the master blowers to execute.’ Many of Scarpa’s designs reinterpreted historical designs using modern methods. His murrine romane combined the traditionally round murrina patterns with the square tiles of Roman mosaics. Revealed at the XXII Venice Biennale of 1940, the Murrine Opache technique is amongst the architect’s greatest technical and stylistic achievements.

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Installation view of the exhibition 1,001 Remarkable Objects at Powerhouse Ultimo, Sydney showing at top left, Bowl, murrine opache, Carlo Scarpa for VSM Paolo Venini & Co, Murano, Venice, Italy, c. 1940; at top centre, Bowl form, Untitled, kiln formed fused mosaic glass, designed and made by Klaus Moje, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia, 1990-1991; at top right, Vase, blown glass with cane inclusions, Lino Tagliapietra, Rozelle, New South Wales, Australia, 1997; and at centre back, Textile length, Mohnkopfe (poppy heads), silk-double weave, Art Nouveau style, woven by Johann Backhausen and Sohne, Vienna, Austria, made by Koloman Moser, Vienna, Austria, 1900-1903

Klaus Moje (Australian born Germany, 1936-2016) (designer and maker, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia)
Bowl form, Untitled
1990-1991
Kiln formed fused mosaic glass
Height: 75 mm
Diameter: 540 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased 1991

Fused Mosaic Glass Bowl by Klaus Moje

This bowl form, ‘Untitled’, was made from fused mosaic Bullseye glass, in Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia, 1990-1991.

Klaus Moje (1936-2016, born Hamburg, Germany) was one of Australia’s most significant glass artists, and also one of the most influential through his teaching in Canberra for 10 years from 1982. His international connections provided many exhibiting and teaching opportunities for others.

The Bullseye Glass Company had been set up in Portland, Oregon, in 1974 by three young glassblowers, Daniel Schwoerer, Boyce Lundstrom and Ray Ahlgren. Schwoerer had also studied glass as graduate assistant to Harvey Littleton at the University of Wisconsin in the 1960s as well as doing graduate work in engineering. Although they were glass blowers, they wanted to support their art through an income-generating industry and saw a need for a manufacturer of flat glass. Schwoerer explains, ‘In the early ’70s the few American companies making opalescent glass were back-ordered for at least two years and weren’t taking on new customers.’ In the following years Ahlgren and Lundstrom both left to start up other glass-related ventures and Lani McGregor, now artistic director of the Bullseye Connection gallery, joined Schwoerer as partner in 1985.

Bullseye kept closely involved with the needs of the marketplace through direct connections with the art world. In the early 1980s Klaus Moje wanted to make kilnformed mosaic glass and needed colours that fused compatibly. He met Lundstrom at the Pilchuck Glass School and found they had a mutual interest in the development of what became Bullseye’s Tested Compatible sheet glasses. ‘Moje provided a huge further inspiration to continue on this path which really had no justifiable commercial rationale at that time,’ says Lani McGregor. This liaison had far-reaching repercussions, especially for Australians, because Moje moved to teach at the Canberra School of Art in 1982: ‘Bullseye made hand-rolled glass for architectural purposes. They saw the problems I had with compatible glass and a limited colour palette…[and] started to see a serious way of entering the studio glass movement with their product.’

By the 1990s Moje wanted to make vessel forms from his fused mosaic sheets. It required further collaboration to develop a glass working process to enable this to happen. He first tried with Bullseye glass at Pilchuck with glassblower Billy Morris in 1987 and again with Dante Marioni in Portland in 1993. Bullseye provided a compatible blowing glass for these sessions, where the sheets were wrapped around a gather of furnace glass, but ‘what eventually came out of them’ says McGregor, ‘was that Klaus discovered that a blowing glass is not necessary for blowing previously fused forms. What Dante was doing was a variation on the long-known Italian pick-up method. What evolved was the truly amazing Australian Roll-up that – although we do now make a blowing compatible glass – doesn’t need it’. Artists were to discover, however, that the provision of these two compatible glasses allows other processes to take place, where, for example, sections of blown and fused glass can be successfully joined using the encalmo technique.

Bullseye’s connection with Australia was established mainly through Moje’s interest in providing opportunities for graduates and colleagues to travel, study and exhibit elsewhere, that were continued later by his successor Stephen Procter, and Jane Bruce. In turn Bullseye became involved in supporting programs in Australia, the most notable being the Latitudes workshops and exhibitions of 1995 and 1997 organised at the Canberra School of Art by Kirstie Rea, where participants experimented with the many options now possible. Kirstie Rea and Scott Chaseling continued their own explorations of these new possibilities, and became well-known in the 1990s for their international ‘Roll-up’ workshops.

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Installation view of the exhibition 1,001 Remarkable Objects at Powerhouse Ultimo, Sydney showing at top, Carved form, Echidna shape, bean wood / echidna quills, painted, Louie Pwerle, Ngkawenyerre camp, Utopia, Northern Territory, Australia, 1996; and at second top, Figure, dog, Devil Dog, wood, Billy Petyarre, Utopia Station, Northern Territory, Australia, 1991; at second bottom, Coolamon, Bush Tomato Dreaming, wood / acrylic paint, Billy Petyarre, Utopia Station, Northern Territory, 1990-1991

Louie Pwerle (Cowboy ‘Louie’ Pula Pwerle (Australian, c. 1940-2022)(Ngkawenyerre camp, Utopia, Northern Territory, Australia)
Carved form, echidna shape
1996
Bean wood/ echidna quills, painted
Height: 160 mm
Width: 170 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased 1996

Carved Echidna by Louie Pwerle

Carved animals and dishes, and painted seed necklaces, are made variously by artists including Queenie Kemarre, Louie Pwerle, Billy Petyarre, Wally Pwerle, Elizabeth Kngwarreye, Angelina Pwerle at the Ngkawenterre camp in the Utopia homelands. This particular camp is known for the carved animals made there.

Goannas, lizards, echidnas and kangaroos are sought after for food, as ‘bush tucker’, while the dogs are ‘devil dogs’. The devil dogs assist the ritual law enforcer, Kwertatye, in the beliefs of this group of Aboriginal people. Carved figures were made in earlier times, but it is not known what these were. The Ngkwarlerlaneme people at Utopia have revived the practice, following the introduction of acrylic painting in the 1980s; the dogs are painted in the manner of acrylic painting. Similalry the silk batiks made by this group often include figures or representations of animals and figures, real or mythological.

Designed and made by Louie Pwerle from a soft wood, locally called beanwood. The echidna is well-known as a form of bush tucker. Louie is part of a family who live at the Ngkawenterre camp in the Utopia homelands, and mostly carves and paints animals. He made three kangaroos in 1989 and none other until 1996, after Rodney Gooch brought back a ‘tree kangaroo’ (squirrel or possum) from Indonesia; following this Louie started to make kangaroos again. Only a few echidnas appear to be made (about 12 in the last 6 years), and only two with real quills seen by the Sydney agent in the last few years. This is (in 1996) the only camp where carved animals, figures and bowls are made, and paintings on canvas are also made at this camp. All the works in this particular collection are made by members of this family at this camp. All are consistent carvers, some like Queenie and Louie since about 1988.

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

AW Standfield and Co (manufacturer, Mascot, New South Wales, Australia, active 1925-2000)
‘Supreme’ Mouse Trap Making Machine
1942-1943
Metal/wood
1950 mm H x 2470 mm W x 1500 mm D
Weight 830 kg
Powerhouse Collection
Acquired October 2001

‘Supreme’ Mouse Trap Making Machine

This mouse trap making machine is part of the Museum’s Standfield collection of trap-making machines and associated items which are an unusual, indeed curious, ensemble of purpose-built machines and products that defined an Australian industry for sixty years.

The collection exemplifies a ‘making do’ approach to manufacturing in that the machines were built from secondhand parts from a range of sources; it also exemplifies the notion of technological stasis in that the machines were always considered efficient and sophisticated artefacts for the making of rodent traps. Likewise, the organisation, traditional skills, and daily customs of the Standfield firm did not change from the Second World War to the end of the twentieth century, a period when rapid industrial change was the norm.

The nature of production at Standfields was based on a belief that a unique machine would provide a quality product whose market was based upon the natural cycle of rodent population size. According to the Standfields, production was never based upon the traditional economic factors of supply and demand, as these concepts did not seem applicable to a production facility of this nature, size, and scale. Productivity was rarely increased or decreased from the machine’s range, that is, 1,000 traps per hour. Product stockpiling was a normative value that was practised by the firm.

Less demonstrative, but deeply embedded in the Standfield approach to manufacturing, was a belief that a well-made and simple product defined an Australian approach to the making of things.

The mouse trap making machine is made from a variety of metal and electronic components, painted white for framework and left plain for working parts. The machine can be divided into two segments consisting of the mouse trap assembly line and the spring and hammer making mechanism.

The front section of the machine features the assembly line from right to left. This section contains an intricate series of levers, pulleys and gears which feed the wooden mouse trap platforms through the production line. On the right is the platform feeder, filled with wooden platforms. From here the bases are pressed in a stamper, leaving the imprint, ‘Supreme / MOUSE TRAP / MADE IN AUSTRALIA’ on the top. The next phase involves the the catch or baiter and the holding bar both being stapled on to the platform. Once through this process, there is an open section in the centre for a worker to manually attach the spring and hammer device to the mousetrap and then place the traps back in the conveyor channel. The traps then pass through a plane or sander to remove any points on the base, and the process is complete. The power switch for this portion of the machine is positioned just below the sander, with a speed switch also present in the machines centre. On each side of the production line segment are different coils of metal, for each of the components used in constructing the mouse traps. Each of the coils is labelled with different specifications, based on their thickness, with some spare coils placed underneath. A counter, in a red casing, can be seen in the centre of the machine, indicating the number of traps which have been processed. Above the counter are two lamps, plugged into a powerboard at the top of the machine, for providing additional light in the dark workshop.

The back section is designed with the specific purpose of constructing the spring and hammer mechanism for the traps. This section also works like a production line with two sets of metal coils, suspended on metal poles, on the right and left sides of the machine. The wires are fed through a set of gears, pulleys and levers, which bend, coil and shape the wire to create the spring and hammer. The finished product reaches the end of the production line and is released down a slide or ramp, into a white tray at the front of the main production line for the worker to retrieve. A power switch can be found on the right side of this section

At the front of the machine is a black and white image of Arnold Wesley Standfield woking on the machine, with the final mousetrap that the machine made stuck to the front. A number of finished and half finished mousetraps as well plain platforms can be found on a wooden shelf on the machines right.

Formal patent applications were taken by Arnold Wesley Standfield for the ‘Westan’ all metal rodent trap, and the Kyogle cow-tail clip. The patent documents are supplemented with schematic designs, which illustrate the operational requirements of the products. Interestingly, no formal machine design or patent was ever taken on Standfield’s principal item, namely, the mouse-trap machine. The Standfield archives hold the patent applications for the ‘Westan’ mouse trap and Kyogle cow-tail clip, as well as other documentary accounts of these items.

The machines, traps, and the cow-tail clip, were entirely the creations of Arnold Wesley Standfield (1901-1990), the founder of A.W. Standfield and Co., ‘Supreme’ Mouse and Rat Traps. His sons Dave and Ron Standfield assisted their father with the repair and maintenance of the machines, and the sons became the owners and managers of the firm upon the death of their father. Knowledge of the machines and its products was passed to the sons by their father, and in turn they passed on knowledge and skill to long-term employees of the firm.

A.W. Standfield made the machine from wheels, gears and pieces of metal taken from scrapped machines he found in scrap-iron yards around Sydney. Although Standfield had no formal training in machining or associated trades, his accomplishment does suggest that he had an innate ability to build production machines. In a single operation, a mouse trap can be assembled in 1.5 seconds. The standard production rate is “over 1,000 traps per hour” (‘Mouse-Trap Making Machine’, n.d. probably composed by A.W. Standfield, Standfield archives).

The machine was made over a two-year period (1942-1943) and the first traps ‘came off’ the machine on 7 January, 1944. The machine is as it was first made, although broken and worn parts have been replaced over the years.

The machine itself makes all parts, and, as mentioned above, assembles a trap in 1.5 seconds. In operational terms, four strands of staple wire are fed, straightened, cut off, folded and driven into the base of the trap. The machine grounds off protruding staple ends. It feeds, straightens, cuts off, and forms into a trigger, wire of 3″ (76.2mm) length of 17 gauge wire, which was supplied by BHP. The machine staples the trigger wire to the pine base.

The machine makes and assembles the bait holder. The machine selects the length of steel for the bait-holder, cuts it, punches and forms the steel into the bait holder and affixes the holder (under the staple) to the pine base. The machine feeds, straightens, and cuts off 18″ (457.2mm) of 17 gauge spring wire and forms this as the mouse-trap spring. In the process, the wire is turned and bent 23 times at varying degrees to make a spring. The mouse-trap machine pushes the piece of pine along a slot and brands the base. The machine turns the spring ends. The spring is fed through and stapled by hand to the base. This operation completes the assembly of a mouse trap.

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Lockheed Aircraft Company (manufacturer, Burbank, California, United States of America)
Aircraft undercarriage from Lockheed Altair monoplane ‘Lady Southern Cross’, starboard side
Probably 1933
Metal/rubber
Height: 1420 mm
Width: 480 mm
Diameter/Length: 1000 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Acquired February 1994

Aircraft undercarriage from the Lady Southern Cross

The only surviving fragment of aircraft in which Sir Charles Kingsford Smith died, 8 November 1935

This wheel and oleo strut are part of the starboard undercarriage used by Sir Charles Kingsford Smith (Smithy) in his Lockheed Altair aircraft VH-USB ‘Lady Southern Cross’ for his attempt at a record breaking flight from England to Australia in 1935. On 8 November 1935 ‘Lady Southern Cross’ is estimated to have crashed into the Gulf of Martaban in the vicinity of Aye Island off the coast of Burma, now Myanmarm, at approximately 0216 local time. The undercarriage is the only major component to have been located and preserved after the loss of the aircraft with Smithy and his co-pilot/engineer, Tom Pethybridge, on board.

Sir Charles Kingsford Smith is Australia’s most renowned pioneer aviator. He established a number of records in a variety of aircraft, most notably the Fokker Trimotor, ‘Southern Cross’. His interest in competing in the MacRobertson Air Race of 1934 gave him the impetus to purchase the Lockheed Altair as an aircraft with the capability of achieving first place, but engineering problems and lack of time mean that he had to withdraw from the race. In testing the aircraft in Australia, he established a number of city to city speed records in the Altair. To ‘save face’ for withdrawing from the race he flew the Pacific instead in the west east direction establishing another record. Smithy and Tom Pethybridge, lost their lives endeavouring to break yet another record, the England-Australia speed record.

The single engined Lockheed monoplane aircraft of the late 1920s and 1930, encompassing the Sirius, Orion, Altair, Air Express, Explorer and Vega, were considered to be revolutionary in their time. According the their ‘biographer’, Richard Sanders Allen in ‘Revolution in the Sky’, those fabulous Lockheeds, the pilots who flew them, “…became the most copied, coveted, news making airplanes of their era”. They achieved a number of records in the hands of such famous aviators as Amelia Earhart, Charles Lindbergh, Wiley Post, Hubert Wilkins and Sir Charles Kingsford Smith, to name a few. As well as providing record breaking aircraft the Lockheed Aircraft Corporation, as it became, used the basic designs and manufacturing techniques to produce small airliners such as the Orion, Air Express and Vega. After the completion of the last of this series of designs Lockheed went on to design and manufacture such significant airliners as the Lockheed 10 Electra and the Lockheed 14 Super Electra. During World War II, Lockheed designed the Constellation which became the backbone of many airlines restarting services post-world War II. Qantas based its fleet on the Constellation before converting to the gas turbine powered Boeing 707.

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

John Lyon Gardiner (maker, Sydney Technical College, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia)
Model staircase
1891
Cedar (Toona australis)
Height: 2730 mm
Width: 1390 mm
Depth: 990 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Presented by Sydney Technical College, 11 November 1953

Model staircase

This model staircase is a significant example of the work of Sydney Technical College instructor, John Lyon Gardiner. It was built to demonstrate the principles of stair construction. Almost from its inception the Museum had a close relationship with the Technical College which was its immediate neighbour in Harris Street. At the time there was a new interest in education through observation or ‘learning by looking’. This was thought particularly important in the training of ‘practical men’ and museum’s were an essential part of this process. As the English philanthropist, Thomas Twining, wrote in Science made easy (1876) about the purpose behind his own Museum in Twickenham, outside London:

‘I became more and more impressed with the desirableness of propagating among the working population, sound practical knowledge calculated to secure for steady persevering industry, a well earned mead of Health and Comfort … [through] VISUAL EDUCATION.’

The staircase is made from cedar which is also significant as, at the time, the Museum was actively promoting commercial applications for colonial timbers.

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

James Brewer (maker, Darlestone, United Kingdom)
Long case clock
1690
Wood/glass/brass/metal
Height: 2240 mm
Width: 495 mm
Depth: 300 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased 1963

John Dewe (maker, London, England)
Long case clock
1733-1764
Lapis-blue Japanned case, wood/metal
Height: 2240 mm
Width: 515 mm
Depth: 240 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased 1964

Installation view of the exhibition 1,001 Remarkable Objects at Powerhouse Ultimo, Sydney showing at top, Man’s ceremonial headpiece (lamba), sheet gold alloy, Sumba, Indonesia, 1880-1950; and at second top, Textile length (mens waist cloth), handwoven cotton / shells / beads, maker unknown, East Sumba, Indonesia, 2000-2004

Installation view detail of the exhibition 1,001 Remarkable Objects at Powerhouse Ultimo, Sydney showing at top, Man’s ceremonial headpiece (lamba), sheet gold alloy, Sumba, Indonesia, 1880-1950; and at second top, Textile length (mens waist cloth), handwoven cotton / shells / beads, maker unknown, East Sumba, Indonesia, 2000-2004

Maker unknown (East Sumba, Indonesia)
Textile length (mens waist cloth)
2000-2004
Handwoven cotton/shells/beads
Width: 560 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased 2010

Pictorial textile from East Sumba

This exceptionally long and narrow pictorial textile was woven on the island of Sumba in Indonesia. While the textile exemplifies the renowned skills of the Sumbanese women weavers, its design is highly innovative and a distinct departure from tradition. Innovation in textile design was not new to the Sumbanese weavers who certainly embodied strong traditions but who, under Dutch colonial rule, were encouraged to produce textiles specially designed to appeal to the Dutch market.

This long textile was probably produced for the tourist trade and reflects innovative approaches to design and production in several respects.

Supplementary warp patterning, known as pahikung on Sumba, has been used in the central decorative band for the full five metre length of the textile. In accomplishing such an extended length of pahikung, the weaver has produced a masterpiece of intricate and evenly tensioned weaving. This exacting technique was generally used for the short and highly decorative bands around a woman’s tube skirt or sarong whereas here it has been combined with the traditional five metre long men’s waist wraps called rohobanggi. However rohobanggi, which had a ritual function, were always woven with a simple design of stripes and had no additional ornament.

The most dominant motif in the textile, which is repeated in pahikung down the middle of the cloth, is a sailing boat with one person wearing a large hat at the tiller and three passengers. Boat motifs are not part of the traditional iconography of Sumbanese art; they are common in Sumatra however, where ‘ship cloths’ appear in several well-known forms. The ship imagery must have been brought to Sumba in some form, probably from Sumatra, for incorporation into the weavers’ design repertoire. Forming a wide border down each side of the cloth, are motifs traditional to Sumba which depict water creatures such as crocodiles, turtles and crayfish and have been worked in beads and small shells. Traditionally, shell decoration was also restricted to women’s tube skirts or sarongs.

Sumbanese textiles have changed significantly through interaction with the Dutch and other global markets, especially during the last decades during which tourism has grown exponentially in Indonesia. As exemplified in this remarkable example, textiles in Sumba today combine ancient ancestral symbols with contemporary images drawn from other sources. Their designers can pick and choose from a wealth of possibilities while still maintaining non-negotiable traditional design forms, weaving techniques and iconography.

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Installation view of the exhibition 1,001 Remarkable Objects at Powerhouse Ultimo, Sydney showing The Transparent Woman (1950-1953, below)

Installation view detail of the exhibition 1,001 Remarkable Objects at Powerhouse Ultimo, Sydney showing a detail of The Transparent Woman (1950-1953, below)

The German Health Museum (Cologne, Germany)
Anatomical model, full size, ‘The Transparent Woman’
1950-1953
Used by Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, 1954-2007
Perspex/aluminium/metal/wood/plastic
Height: 1740 mm
Width: 1060 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased 1958

The Transparent Woman

This the first transparent anatomical model of a woman ever to be exhibited in Australia.

In 1939 the director of the Museum, Arthur Penfold, embarked on an international study tour visiting many different museums and galleries overseas. He visited museums in both Chicago and New York and became captivated by their displays of transparent human models and their promotion of healthy living and sanitary practices. Due to lack of funding, the Transparent Woman was not acquired by the Museum until 1954. She was the first electronic scientific anatomical model to be displayed in Australia and was acquired to further the Museum’s mission to shape model citizens.

People have historically been curious about seeing what is inside objects, especially the human body. In the nineteenth century members of the public were able to witness dissections on cadavers; however the sights, and smells must have been overwhelming at times. The technology then became available to preserve human organs and make them semi-transparent by passing light through them. People were able to see what was inside the body without the blood and guts of dissections. Papier mache and wax models were used and, with advancements in plastics technology, clear and flexible plastic became available for model making.

These models were a German innovation, originating in the early 1930s at the Museum of Hygiene in Dresden. They served as a teaching aid for students of anatomy, and promoted a message of health and sanitation to the general public. The models were based on ‘perfect forms’, of young men and women, and symbolised the healthy body that people should strive to achieve. Germany was undergoing rapid industrialisation; thus prompted rapid urban growth accompanied by inadequate sanitation. The German Government promoted the use of these models as a way of educating and preserving a healthy working class. In the early 1950s the Health Museum in Cologne, West Germany, was established and began producing the transparent models and exporting them to America and other countries.

In the late 1930s some thought that the transparent models were symbols of Nazi ideal racial ideology, most who saw them were transfixed by the eugenic ideal of a healthy body. The Powerhouse Museum’s Transparent Woman arrived in 1954 to advocate a message of individual responsibility to maintain a healthy body.

It is hard to imagine being shocked or offended by this model, but the Transparent Woman must have been something of a spectacle in the 1950s. On importation it is recorded that one customs official was so offended by the nature of the exhibit that she almost never made it into the country. To cover some of the huge cost involved in obtaining the model, she was put on displayed in the State Theatre and the public were charged 2 shillings per adult and 9 pence per child to see her. The viewing sessions were segregated by gender and a trained nurse was on standby to assist if anyone was overcome by the experience. To add to the sensationalism she was marketed using images depicting a dark and shadowy ‘sex siren’ type of woman.

After several months at the State Theatre, the Transparent Woman was moved to the Museum where she continued efforts to promote health and hygiene. The accompanying souvenir booklet proclaimed, “The transparent woman will help us to understand the mysteries of our body, nature’s crowning masterpiece. The transparent woman tells us how our body is made and how it works [she] provides us with the means towards greater understanding of ourselves – so necessary to our wellbeing and healthy living, it is the responsibility of the individual to keep his body healthy so that he may live a useful and a successful life.”.

She later assisted in the Museum’s first attempts to discuss the subject of sex. During the 1970s and 1980s the museum utilised the Transparent Woman to provide human anatomy lessons for school groups. Children were allowed to ask questions and teachers were assured that the museum’s education officers would “endeavour to answer each question openly and as scientifically as possible if the subject of reproduction was raised”. The model was a significant public education tool and, as her accompanying booklet declares, “has helped lift the veil of mystery from womanhood”.

The Transparent Woman has a long history of service to Museum. Starting life as a controversial sensation, she then became the iconic symbol of the Museum’s hygienic crusade. In the past 50 years she has been used to demonstrate how the nervous system works, for sex education, and to demonstrate the areas of the body where contraceptive activities take place. The Powerhouse Museum has a collection of over 380,000 objects, only a small amount of which are on display at any one time, yet the Transparent Woman has spent little of her working life in storage.

References:
Correspondence. A. R. Penfold to F.R. Morrison, 27th Oct 1952, museum records.
The Transparent Woman [souvenir booklet]. Sydney, 1954.
Internal Correspondence. A.R. Penfolds overseas trip, 1939, museum records.
Internal Correspondence. Memorandum to the Secretary: Department of Technical Education, Sydney, From A. R. Penfold, Museum Director, 22nd November, 1954, museum records.
Terence Measham, Discovering the Powerhouse Museum, Powerhouse Publishing, Sydney, 1997, pp. 139-147.
Klaus Vogel. Manifesting Medicines, Bodies and Machines: The transparent man- some comments on the history of a symbol, Harwood Academic Publishers, Netherlands, 1999.
Graeme Davidson and Kimberley Webber. Yesterday’s Tomorrows: The Powerhouse Museum and its Precursors 1880-2005. Powerhouse Publishing, Sydney, 2005, pp. 68-81.
The Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences Annual Report, 1954, museum records.

Written by Erika Dicker
Assistant Curator, October 2007

A life-size anatomical model of a woman with transparent plastic casing revealing her internal construction. The skeleton is cast aluminium painted white. The arterial and venous systems are represented by red and blue coloured plastic tubing. The nervous and lymphatic systems are represented by brown and green coloured plastic tubing.

The body organs and brain are made from pink, orange, brown and yellow plastics. The plastic organs consist of the brain, larynx, thyroid gland, lungs, heart, liver, gall bladder, spleen, pancreas, stomach, small intestine, caecum, transverse intestine, large intestine, rectum, kidneys, bladder, ovaries, womb and breasts. The organs and brain are fitted with small pilot lights that are controlled from the console to illuminate during different parts of a pre-recorded presentation.

The figure is standing on a turntable, is raised on a two tier platform, which contains rotating mechanisms and loud speakers. The wooden console contains an automatic operating tape recorder and relay switches to operate lighting of organs and rotation of figure.

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Philippe Starck (designer) (French, b. 1949)
Daum Crystal (manufacturer, Nancy, France)
Table vase, ‘Quatre Etrangetes sous un mur’ (Four curiosities below a wall)
1988
Glass
Height: 490 mm
Width: 600 mm
Depth: 500 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased 1996

Vivienne Westwood (designer, London, England) (English, 1941-2022)
Shoes (pair), ‘Super Elevated Gillie’, ‘Anglomania’ collection, Autumn / Winter 1993-1994
1993
Leather/cork/silk
Height: 270 mm
Width: 68 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased 1997

Powerhouse today unveiled 1001 Remarkable Objects, a major new exhibition led by Leo Schofield AM.

‘Our vision for 1001 Remarkable Objects was a seemingly simple one: to create an exhibition celebrating the sheer scale, breadth and relevance of the Powerhouse Collection. But how to choose? We rejected the nomenclature of ‘treasures’ or ‘masterpieces’ and instead determined all choices must be in some way ‘remarkable’ – whether by virtue of rarity, visual appeal, social history or an ability to invoke wonder. The result is a cornucopia of eras, styles, form, function, size and colour, to stoke memories that so many have of this iconic institution and signal the beginning of a new phase in its marvellous existence’, said Curatorium Chair Leo Schofield AM.

Leo Schofield AM has a long association with Powerhouse, as a former member of the Board of Trustees and a significant donor. He has worked in collaboration with advisors Ronan Sulich, Mark Sutcliffe and Powerhouse curator Eva Czernis-Ryl to select 1001 objects from the more than half a million objects within the collection. This selection includes objects that have never been exhibited before alongside much loved collection icons.

The Powerhouse Collection will be presented across the applied arts and applied sciences including the decorative arts, jewellery, costume, textiles, furniture, clocks, musical instruments, industrial design and social history.

Exhibition designers Pip Runciman, Julie Lynch and Ross Wallace were invited to respond to underlying themes of nature, power, movement and joy. They have created an exhibition that features more than 25 rooms, presenting an unexpected juxtaposition of objects and leads visitors on a journey across time and memory.

Extraordinary objects include a rare Meissen porcelain satirical portrait bust of the court jester known as Baron Schmiedel, made in 1739; the only surviving fragment of the Lockheed Altair aircraft Lady Southern Cross flown by pioneer aviator Sir Charles Kingsford Smith for his final flight in 1935; an Edo period samurai warrior’s suit of armour; and a Detroit Electric car manufactured in 1917.

Musical instruments include a double bass made in 1856 by John Devereux, one of the oldest surviving bowed string instruments made in Australia by a professional instrument maker; an acoustic guitar decorated with hand painted designs by Harold ‘The Kangaroo’ Thornton; and an upright bookcase grand piano, made in 1809.

Fashion highlights include a 1700s court dress; an evening dress by Gabrielle ‘Coco’ Chanel for her Spring collection of 1939; a pair of Super Elevated Gillie platform shoes by British designer Vivienne Westwood from Anglomania, her Autumn/Winter collection 1993-1994; and Romance Was Born’s 2009 ‘Iced VoVo’ dress.

Costumes include the ‘Showgirl’ costume worn by Kylie Minogue for the Closing Ceremony of the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games; the ‘Pink Diamonds’ dress worn by Nicole Kidman in the Baz Luhrmann film, Moulin Rouge and the ‘Fruity Mambo’ costumes designed by Catherine Martin for Strictly Ballroom the Musical.

More than 100 rare and remarkable pieces of jewellery will highlight a recent major donation by Anne Schofield AM. This includes Egyptian revival designs from the 1800s and mourning jewellery crafted from human hair, which will be on display at Powerhouse for the first time.

French and Venetian glass from the 1800-1900s will be presented, as will an English stained-glass window, ‘The Delphic Sibyl’, based on an 1873 painting by Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones made by Morris & Co about 1900, alongside key examples of Australian and international studio glass ranging from Dale Chihuly to Canberra-based artist Jennifer Kemarre Martiniello and Sydney-based artist Brian Hirst.

‘Leo Schofield and his collaborators, through this exhibition, shed new light and new perspectives on the Powerhouse Collection. In 1001 Remarkable Objects we continue to extend our commitment to sharing with our communities the Powerhouse Collection and the many insights and connections it makes to both our past and our future’, said Powerhouse Chief Executive Lisa Havilah.

Powerhouse will present two special Powerhouse Late programs presented in collaboration with Liquid Architecture. The first program on 5 October is an exploration of the unusual and remarkable sonics in response to the exhibition with creative practitioners who evoke a range of moods through their work. On 23 November, a range of artists will take inspiration from the designers who have created unique worlds for these objects in conjunction with a celebration to launch companion publication 1001.

Press release from the Powerhouse

J Hubert Newman (photographer, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia) (Australian, c. 1835-1916)
Untitled [young boy in sailor suit]
Nd
Carte de visite
Paper/card
Height: 165 mm
Width: 107 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Acquired September 1984

Charles Letaille (designer)
J Pintard (publisher, Rue Saint-Jacques, Paris, France)
Toy theatre, ‘La Pleine Mer, Scenes Maritimes en Action’
1836
Paper/cardboard/textile/metal/timber
Height: 320 mm
Width: 704 mm
Depth: 85 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased with funds donated by the Patrons of the Powerhouse, 1985

Children’s toy theatre, ‘La Pleine Mer’ (The Open Sea) by Charles Lataille

This extremely rare, hand-coloured, French children’s toy theatre ‘La Pleine Mer, Scenes Maritimes en Action’ (‘The Open Sea, Maritime Scenes in Action’) dates from 1836. The theatre comprises an ocean backdrop, a middle ground of waves and foreground of a South Pacific island reef. Numerous cardboard pieces of French ships, long boats, a drowning sailor and a shark attack can be slid in and out of the scene. By means of a booklet of seven short melodramatic plays (in French), to be read aloud by an adult or teacher, the drama and excitement of maritime adventures in the exotic South Pacific can be performed. The plays cover accounts of Australian aborigines fishing and building canoes, visits by French wayfarers to the Solomon Islands and Tahiti, and Maoris in New Zealand.

Many children’s theatres were made in the early 19th century with their popularity peaking between 1830 and 1860 when adult theatre was enjoying an unprecedented success with melodramas, masques and pantomimes. English toy theatres were the most complex often with a proscenium, stage, trap-doors, machinery for working curtains and trick effects, supports for scenery and a multitude of characters. However, Continental publishers produced simplified versions, although what they lacked in technical complexity was made up in settings and characters. French theatres, such as this one produced by J. Pintard in Paris, were noted for their beautiful hand-colouring.

Toys of the mid to late 19th century were designed to be educational rather than for play. The toy theatre, ‘La Pleine Mer’, would have instructed children in aspects of navigation, maritime life, exploration, geography and the people of the Pacific. The theatre features an unusual and appealing use of maritime pictorial material which is drawn heavily from books, paintings and journals of discovery of the day. It illustrates a popular representation of Australia and the South Pacific at the time. The theatre is one of the earliest graphic representations of Australia and the South Seas in the Museum’s collection. Furthermore, whereas the books, journals and paintings of this period survive in state, national and international libraries and art galleries virtually no toys depicting content related to Australia and the South Pacific in the 1830s are extant worldwide.

Margaret Simpson
Curator, Transport & Toys
August 2011

Mitchell, Louise, ‘La Pleine Mer Sailing over a cardboard sea’, in The Australian Antique Collector, 36th edition, 1988. pp. 37-41.

Publication of La Pleine Mer noted in Bibliographie de la France, 10 December 1836, p. 597, entry No. 6239.

Toy theatre comprising 27 printed and hand-coloured lithographic cardboard pieces, in a South Pacific setting. When assembled the theatre comprises a painted backdrop with two ships under sail flying French colours, a longboat pulling away, more ships in the background and a blue sky with clouds. Between this and the proscenium are five ranks of waves (two of which have wooden runners to support the moving pieces).

The foreground features lush tropical vegetation and a reef battered by breakers. It is in three parts with a base showing the shore and large pieces which are installed at the left and right composed of trees and rocks. There are seven separate lithograph boats, one for each of the plays, with a further six separate pieces to be added in where instructed in the script. The scenes are either fixed into slots in the foreground or locked into a balance placed on wooden runners obscured by the middle waves.

The script comprises a 32-page booklet designed to be read aloud by an adult or older child while the different scenes are activated. The plays depict customs of the Solomon Islands, Natives of New Guinea and Tahiti, whaling activity in the South Pacific and landing in New Zealand.

According to the ‘Bibliographie de la France’, this toy theatre was produced by J. Pintard on 10 December 1836. Pintard’s other toy theatres had titles including ‘Le Theatre Enfantin’, ‘Le Spectacle Asiatique’, ‘Ou Danse et Voltige sur La Corde’ and ‘La Voiere’.

In keeping with most toymakers of the period, Pintard produced a variety of toys and related material aimed at educating children in art, geography, scripture, history and natural history. Advertising his stock at the conclusion of the ‘La Pleine Mer’ script, he claimed “L’enseignement de la moral la plus pure forme la base de tous ces petits ouvrages instructifs” (“The moral teaching in its purest form is the basis of all these little educational works”).

This toy theatre, ‘La Pleine Mer’, includes seven plays written by Charles Letaille, who also produced the lithography. Letaille collaborated with his publisher to produce other children’s material during the 1830s and 1840s. The first play is entitled ‘The Sea, The Birth of Navigation’ and describes the simple craft of the natives of New Holland (Australia) and concludes with an account of the carved and outrigger canoes of New Guinea and Tahiti.

In the more dramatic second play, ‘The Whale’, native canoes are replaced with a spouting whale and a long boat from the whaling ship ‘Albatross’. The narrative begins in a bay of the Chilean coast and concludes with a whale-hunting drama. The play instructs children about the uses of whale products, (whale rib bones for umbrellas and whale fat boiled on board in large vats for oil) and includes a gruesome description of the sailors climbing over the carcass of the whale while tied to the side of the ship to remove the ribs, skin and fat.

The third and fourth plays, entitled ‘Man Overboard’ and ‘The Rescue’, describe an unlucky sailor falling overboard from the ship and being thrown a woven cane life preserver. In the meantime the ship is brought into the wind and the long boat launched for the sailor’s rescue.

The next play ‘The Shark’ begins with the deceptively calm description: “We are aboard the American three-master ‘Oceanic’ the sea breeze was barely enough to cause the waves to break on the nearby beach”. The pace picks up quickly with nail biting anticipation as it is revealed the ship’s master is repeatedly diving from the ship and hauling himself up on a rope to cool off from the heat while a short distance away a shark’s fin creates a “frothing shimmering wake”. Climbing into a small boat, the sailors go to his rescue. Gripped with fear they ‘could all foresee the struggle that was about to take place between themselves and the shark; a terrible struggle with a man as the contest’.

In the final play, ‘Putting in at New Zealand’, native figures are slotted into the foreground and a longboat is set into the waves. The play relates the meeting between French sailors and friendly Maoris. After an exchange of branches, the natives return with the sailors in their canoes and a priestess is invited on board ship. Attempts to rub noses with the ship’s steward end in chaos when he makes a sudden movement dislodging his wig and frightening the priestess into believing that he is a sorcerer.

According to Louise Mitchell in her article ‘La Pleine Mer Sailing over a cardboard sea’ many of the original details in the lithographs seen in this toy theatre can be traced to paintings, books and journals of the period. For example, the lithograph depicting New Holland natives tumbling from their capsized canoe while spearing fish, can be traced to an illustration by the Scottish engraver and miniaturist, John Heaviside Clark (c. 1777-1863). Clark had never seen Australian aborigines but adhered to the popular European imagery of them as being noble and savage sportsmen. The illustration appeared in a book published in London in 1813 with the title ‘Field sports & of the Native Inhabitants of New South Wales’, reprinted a year later as a supplement to ‘Foreign Field Sports, Fisheries, Sporting Anecdotes, etc’.

Several of the script’s plays can be traced to a journal entitled ‘La France Maritime’. The shark attack lithograph was derived from an American romantic horror-painting of 1778 by John Singleton Copley (1738-1815) ‘Watson and the Shark’. In the toy theatre play the man overboard facing a shark’s jaws of death is pulled to safety. Ironically, the victim in the play ends up being the 16-foot shark which is split open by the ship’s cook. In a scene which initially evokes terror the mood is transformed into humour when the sailors discover that a man’s otter-skin hat belonging to the ship’s doctor is inside the shark’s stomach. (Clothes and belongings hung over the side of ships were regularly eaten by sharks).

Other illustrations can be traced to ‘Le Voyage Pittoresque Autour du Monde’ also published in 1836 by the French explorer of the South Pacific renowned for his seamanship, Jules Dumont d’Urville (1790-1842). A canoe from the Solomon Islands and a Tahitian sailing boat are directly derived from d’Urville’s book.

By the 1830s Europeans were familiar with many popular accounts of seamen’s journals of scientific and exploratory maritime expeditions. Suitable pictorial material was also available from the atlases of the Pacific voyages of Cook, La Perouse, d’Urville and others, and were reproduced extensively in all kinds of publications.

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Charles Letaille (designer)
J Pintard (publisher, Rue Saint-Jacques, Paris, France)
Toy theatre, ‘La Pleine Mer, Scenes Maritimes en Action’ (detail)
1836
Paper/cardboard/textile/metal/timber
Height: 320 mm
Width: 704 mm
Depth: 85 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased with funds donated by the Patrons of the Powerhouse, 1985

Installation view of the exhibition 1,001 Remarkable Objects at Powerhouse Ultimo, Sydney showing at centre an architectural model of the Macquarie Lighthouse made by the Department of Navigation, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, c. 1880

Installation view detail of the exhibition 1,001 Remarkable Objects at Powerhouse Ultimo, Sydney showing at centre an architectural model of the Macquarie Lighthouse made by the Department of Navigation, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, c. 1880

Architectural model, Macquarie Lighthouse, c. 1880

This lighthouse model is a record of a significant Sydney building and landmark. It shows the design of the second lighthouse built on the sight at Dunbar Head, Vaucluse, lit in 1883, and designed by colonial architect James Barnet. The original lighthouse, designed by convict architect Francis Greenway and lit in 1818 had deteriorated by 1823 due to the soft sandstone used in construction.

Scottish immigrant James Barnet arrived in Sydney in 1854. A trained builder and architect, he became Clerk of Works at the University of Sydney soon after his arrival. in 1860 he joined the Colonial Architect’s Office, and within two years was its Head. Barnet was strongly influenced by the Italian Renaissance, and had no sympathy for new American styles of architecture which were becoming fashionable in Sydney at the end of the century. He was equally critical of domestic architecture cluttered with ornamentation. As colonial architect for twenty-five years he has had a lasting influence the architecture of Sydney. As well as the genesis of the Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences, the 1879 Sydney International Exhibition Garden Palace building, Barnet’s buildings include the 1857 new wing of the Australian Museum, the Sydney General Post Office at Martin Place, Customs House, Medical School Anderson Stuart building at the University of Sydney, Callan Park Lunatic Asylum, East Sydney Technical College, Darlinghurst Court House, Victoria Lodge at the Botanical Gardens, and Mortuary Station, Central Railway.

The Macquarie Lighthouse is Australia’s longest serving lighthouse, and its current state is still well represented by this over-a-century year old model.

Damian McDonald
Curator

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Department of Navigation, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia
Architectural model, Macquarie Lighthouse
c. 1880
Wood / plastic
Height: 1885 mm
Width: 975 mm
Depth: 420 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Gift of Port Authority of New South Wales, 2015

Installation views of the exhibition 1,001 Remarkable Objects at Powerhouse Ultimo, Sydney showing 1880s Murano glass from Venice, Italy made by the Venice & Murano Glass and Mosaic Co. (except from the very top piece in the first image, which is a vase, ‘Ronces’ (Thorns), model 946, glass, designed by René Lalique, 1921, made by René Lalique et Cie, Wingen-sur-Moder, France, c. 1950)

W & M Stodart (maker, London, England)
Upright grand piano
1809
Timber, metal/ivory/fabric
Height: 2480 mm
Width: 1100 mm
Depth: 560 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Bequest of Mr William F Bradshaw, 2010

Upright Grand Piano by W & M Stodart

This upright grand bookcase piano is the first of its type to enter the Powerhouse Museum’s collection and the earliest upright piano to be found in it. Dating from 1809 it is made by one of London’s leading piano manufacturers, Matthew and William Stodart, and one of the few examples of this type of piano to be found in Australia. Apart from its rarity it is significant for its construction and design showing the transition from the standard horizontal grand piano to the cabinet piano, which then developed further into the upright piano known today.

This style of upright grand is also unique as it was purposely designed to incorporate a bookcase and therefore had the dual function of musical instrument and drawing room furniture. The style was first patented by William Stodart, one of the makers of this piano, in 1795. Rosamond Harding recounts that Joseph Haydn visited the Stodart shop and “expressed himself delighted with the new possibilities it foreshadowed in case-making and with the quality of tone.” (Harding, p. 63).

Unlike later upright pianos the design is similar to a horizontal grand which has been inverted to the vertical from the keyboard. This accounts for the great height of these instruments, having approximately the same string length as horizontal grand pianos of the time. The bookcase piano was an ornate instrument and expensive to buy as well as produce. This together with their unwieldy height and lack of portability as well as tuning difficulties contributed to bookcase grands only being produced up until about 1825. From this time the upright idea evolved further into the cabinet piano where the string and soundboard section of the piano was dropped to floor level thus reducing the height. This created other problems related to the position the hammers needed to be in to strike the strings to produce an optimum tone. This lead to further developments in piano action design to overcome the problem.

However, the trend to make pianos as ornate pieces of domestic furniture continued well into the 19th century when cabinet pianos would continue to be decorated with ornate fabric fronts or large mirrors, suitable for large domestic rooms.

Michael Lea
Curator, music & musical instruments
March 2010

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Installation view of the exhibition 1,001 Remarkable Objects at Powerhouse Ultimo, Sydney showing John Devereux’s Double bass (1856, below)

John Devereux (Australian born England, (c. 1815-1883)(maker, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia)
Double bass
1856
Red brown varnish, European Spruce/European Maple/Australian Cedar/brass/paper
Height: 1990 mm
Width: 655 mm
Depth: 385 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased with the assistance of the Australian Government through the National Cultural Heritage Account and supporters of the Powerhouse Museum Foundation and the Pinchgut Opera, 2007

Double Bass made by John Devereux

John Devereux is one of the earliest violin makers known to have been working in Australia and is seen as Australia’s first professional bowed string instrument maker. He had a significant reputation and output from the 1860s to 1880s and was a contemporary of Australia’s other great maker of this period William Dow, also of Melbourne. Born in England in 1810, Devereux arrived in Australia in 1854 from London where he had been working in the workshop of violin maker Bernhard Simon Fendt (1800-1852). He settled in Melbourne and operated a violin making business there until his death in 1883. Apart from double basses he is known to have made violins, violas and cellos. He was apparently an accomplished double bass player and performed regularly at Government House in Melbourne. …

This double bass is possibly Devereux’s earliest instrument made in Australia that still survives. The instrument is made as a 3 string rather than 4 string bass which denotes an early period in bass making generally. Although the label is not original the bass has all the same characteristics of Devereux’s other instruments including two features that typify his work in Australia – his use in his double basses of Australian cedar especially for the back and an internal tension bar running the length of the body of the instrument from top to bottom. Independent assessments of the instrument also confirm this as a Devereux instrument. Most Devereux instruments remaining in original condition contain the tension bar which he devised in Australia to strengthen the instrument and prevent twisting of it in the Australian climate. This rigidity was also a way of keeping his instruments in tune in the local climate. There are only 4 other Australian made Devereux basses known to exist which date from a later period to this one.

In addition to the double bass the Powerhouse Museum also contains 2 violins by Devereux dating from 1869 and 1871 respectively, a viola by Devereux dated 1869, the 1866 gold medallion inter-colonial exhibition award, referred to above, and a separate tension bar and labels.

The exact number of instruments John Devereux made is unknown. Double basses made by Devereux both when he worked in London and in Australia survive, however, only five Australian made basses are currently known. Devereux also made violins, violas and cellos in Australia and examples of his work in general exist. He exhibited in a number of inter-colonial exhibitions and the catalogues of these mention the types of instruments he made. These catalogues also state that he used both European and Australian native timbers for his instruments.

Michael Lea,
Curator, music and musical instruments
May 2007

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Lorenzo (maker, Japan)
Guitar
c. 1975
Painted and used by Harold ‘The Kangaroo’ Thornton, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, 1980-2000
Handpainted, wood/nylon/plastic/metal/paper
Height: 1150 mm
Width: 375 mm
Depth: 97 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Gift of Philip Thornton, 2018

Hand painted Guitar by Harold ‘The Kangaroo’ Thornton

The guitar is part of a collection of extraordinary outfits and objects belonging to artist Harold ‘The Kangaroo’ Thornton (1915-2004), the creator of one of Australia’s rare historically themed art works, ‘Dr Brown and Green Old Time Waltz’. Hand painted by Harold, the guitar beautifully represents Harold’s personality and passion for art which shines through all of his works. In common with the other painted pieces in the collection, the artwork on the guitar is characterised by a sense of exuberant boldness and carefree abandon. The use of kaleidoscopic colours, uninhibited patterns both geometric and organic, mirrors Harold’s sense of playfulness and joy for life.

Largely self taught, Harold began painting at 8 years of age following the traditional art conventions of the times. It wasn’t until the 1980s however that Harold began painting in the style that perfectly matched his personality and philosophy of life. Stylistically, his work has been described as ‘psychedelic, naive or magic realistic’. Harold was never interested in making money or being aligned to a specific genre. His single-minded focus was to paint whatever took his fancy in his own inimitable way.

Several well-known Australian artists including Ken Done, Martin Sharp and body artist, Tim Gratton acknowledge Harold’s influence on their work. Largely denied recognition as a serious artist in life, over time there has been a growing appreciation of Harold’s artistic gift.

Glynis Jones and Wendy Circosta, 2017
Curator and Curatorial Volunteer

This guitar was hand painted by artist, Harold ‘The Kangaroo’ Thornton in Sydney possibly between 1980 and 1995.

Prominent Australian, Dr Bob Brown has described Harold as a ‘very unusual character. He had a little goatee, a wisp of beard coming out of his chin and he had a naked woman enamelled on to one of his teeth.’ Born in Enfield, an inner west suburb of Sydney, in 1915, Harold Leslie Thornton began his art career at the age of 8 when he used to write signs for the local butcher and grocer. Finding school a waste of time, he left at age 14 to work as a sign writer, learning by watching how others worked. In later years he spent some time at the Julian Ashton Art School and Desiderius Orban School of Art (1944-46), though he remained largely self-taught. In 1937, Harold departed Sydney with a friend on a motorbike and ended up settling in Griffith, New South Wales until 1941. Painting and wrestling were sources of income at this time. During the remainder of World War II, he lived in Sydney and worked as a sign painter at several places in the war industry. It wasn’t until after World War II that Harold began painting in earnest.

Harold returned to Griffith in 1947 and ran a sign writing business. In 1950 he began touring the Australian countryside setting up his own mini exhibitions in places such as Condobolin, Leeton, Wagga Wagga, Wollongong and Griffith for the next 10 years. He returned to Sydney in 1963.

He has said in both print and recorded interviews that he didn’t fit the mould of what the established art world considered an artist. From head to toe, he dressed flamboyantly in clothes which he’d fashioned and painted and he revelled in fun, whimsy and theatricality that had the art world questioning, ‘was he an artist or a showman’. Self-styled ‘ The Greatest Genius That Ever Lived’, Harold believed very much tongue in cheek that ‘You are what the public thinks you are so I’m the greatest genius that ever lived!’

Not represented by any local dealers and disenchanted with the power of art critics to make or break an artist, Harold left Australia to live in Papua New Guinea from 1968-1970 before making his way to Amsterdam where he spent many years creating art, writing songs and modelling for art classes. In Amsterdam, Harold received the recognition that the Sydney academic art world denied him. Known for his painted murals on shop windows, he was a well-loved and recognised figure in Amsterdam. His most famous mural was painted in 1975 on ‘The Bulldog’, one of the first establishments where marijuana from around the world could be sampled. It is now a landmark site protected by the Netherlands National Trust.

Harolds’s earlier works followed the more conventional style of realistic portraiture and landscapes. It wasn’t until the 1980s that Harold developed his own ‘magic realistic’ style. Nonconformist and reminiscent of psychedelia describes not only his art but Harold himself. A larger than life figure, he dedicated his life to his art, surrounding himself with objects that had received the ‘genius’ treatment, including clothing, accessories, his van, and a guitar and suitcase which are both included in the Museum’s collection.

Professionally, Harold had three portraits selected as finalists in the prestigious Archibald Prize which is held annually at the Art Gallery of NSW: comic Roy Rene (1948), Al Grassby (1982) Minister for Immigration in the Whitlam Government and Dr Bob Brown (1983), founder and leader of the Greens political party. Dr Brown was the subject of a very important Australian historical work, ‘Dr Brown and Green Old Time Waltz’ which is held in the National Portrait Gallery in Canberra. It documents the story of one of Australia’s most controversial environmental issues – the Gordon-below-Franklin Project. He also held several exhibitions in Sydney, Griffith and Amsterdam and has influenced well known Australian artists, Martin Sharp, Ken Done and Tim Gratton.

Harold died on 7 April 2004, leaving an archive of over 200 paintings. His greatest wish was for all of his paintings to be in the one place on permanent exhibition.

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Edward William Godwin (designer) (English, 1833-1886)
William Watt (maker, England, 1834-1885)
Sideboard
1867-1880
Oak/metal
Height: 1810 mm
Width: 2550 mm
Depth: 520 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased 1991

Sideboard designed by Edward William Godwin

Edward William Godwin (1833-1886) was one of the most important designers of the English design reform movement in the second half of the 19th century. He was an active and influential member of the Aesthetic Movement and the first 19th century English furniture designer to turn to Japanese art for inspiration. His emphasis on the need to reconcile function and design, utility and beauty did much to redirect Victorian design and is now believed to have influenced the direction of 20th century design. The Anglo-Japanese sideboard is one of the earliest pieces of furniture by Godwin and expresses his enthusiasm for Japanese design as well as the importance he attached to function, lightness and simplicity. The sideboard remained his most radical Japanese-inspired design and is his best known piece of furniture.

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Christopher Dresser (designer, British, 1834-1906)
J.W. Hukin and J.T. Heath (maker, London, England)
Kettle and burner on stand
1878
Electroplated silver/wood
Height: 275 mm
Width: 223 mm
Depth: 170 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased 1991

Kettle and burner on stand designed by Christopher Dresser

This kettle was designed by Christopher Dresser for J.W. Hukin and J.T. Heath in London in 1878. A trained botanist and a visionary designer who bridged the gap between art and industry in Victorian England, Dr Christopher Dresser was a leading design reformer of the era. As opposed to John Ruskin and William Morris, Christopher Dresser was an enthusiastic advocate of the machine, believing that household items should be more affordable while being both beautiful and functional. The association of simplicity with progress led him to reject the taste for rich decoration of Victorian historicism and naturalism which used representational, often relief ornaments indiscriminately applied to objects. Dresser’s interest in forms based on the structure of plants, his emphasis on function in design and the economic use of materials such as electroplated silver, have no precedent in Western design traditions.

Dresser had a passion for Japanese art, which was rediscovered by the West in the 1850s, strengthened by his travel to Japan in 1876. The kettle’s chased plum-blossom-and-bamboo decoration, the angular spout and feet, straight wooden handle and exposed rivets reference the Japanese aesthetic. Dresser diverse designs for metal, textiles, glass and ceramics inspired by Japanese art and design are also associated with the Aesthetic movement which has a strong impact on the visual arts, literature and fashionable living in Britain from the 1860s to the 1895 trial of the writer Oscar Wilde, the movement’s best-known advocate and exponent. With its famous credo ‘art for art’s sake’, it highlighted the aesthetic value of the arts, privileging beauty over any moral or didactive purpose.

Eva Czernis-Ryl, Curator

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones (English, 1833-1898)(designer)
William Morris Workshops (maker, England)
Stained glass window, ‘The Delphic Sibyl’
1869-1875
Glass/lead
Height: 1549 mm
Width: 915 mm
Depth: 140 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased with funds donated by the Patrons of the Powerhouse, 1984

‘The Delphic Sibyl’ window designed by Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones

This magnificent stained-glass window entitled, ‘Sibylla Delphica’, was produced in about 1900 in the workshops of Morris & Co. at Merton Abbey southwest of London after designs by the pre-Raphaelite painter, Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones.

The window is an example of work from the Arts and Crafts Movement (1850s-1930s), which was born in industrialised England out of enthusiasm for the ‘morally superior’ work of the medieval craftsman. The movement was led by the great Victorian philosopher and art critic, John Ruskin, and the influential designer, William Morris.

While the Arts and Crafts movement drew on different cultures and periods, its members were united in their opposition to poor design standards and the dehumanising effects of industrialisation. They mostly handcrafted objects in small workshops, explored traditional techniques and materials and intended to make beautiful objects for all.

William Morris set out to produce only the finest quality furnishings for discerning customers including furniture and stained glass. This window is a later version of one made in England for the chapel of Jesus College, Cambridge, in 1872. Morris was most likely responsible for the pale painted botanical patterned background and stylised canopy of vines which frame the figure of Sibyl. (Sibyls were women the Ancient Greeks believed were oracles).

William Morris was a poet, writer, politician and conservationist as well as being an artist, designer and manufacturer, whose products underpinned a successful, long-lasting business. His innate ability to unify form, colour and pattern and his boundless creativity made him the most innovative and outstanding pattern designer of his generation. Even in the 1900s Morris’ wallpaper and textile designs remained popular.

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Attributed to the painter of ‘Group of Taranto 305’, Athens, Greece
Amphora with cover, Attic black figure
530-510 BC
Red earthenware
Height: 470 mm
Width: 265 mm
Depth: 270 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Gift of Sir Robert Webster and Sir Norman Rydge, 1952

Attic Black Figure Amphora

The amphora was made in Greece, c. 530-510 BC. The amphora is part of a large group of over 300 vessels (mostly amphorae) which are stylistically very closely related. More than 150 of these vessels have been divided into closely related groups, one called ‘Group of Taranto 305’ to which this amphora belongs, probably painted by one artist.

Terracotta amphora with Attic black figure design on a red ground. The amphora has a pedestalled foot, bulbous body, rounded shoulders and slim neck with flaring rim. Two ribbed strap handles extend from the shoulders to the top of neck. On one side is a female figure holding her cloak around her head and shoulders like a veil, a traditional gesture of modesty, especially associated with a bride. To the left, a satyr approaches with one arm outstretched; another satyr approaches from the right. This scene possibly represents Ariadne about to be conducted to her marriage to Dionysus. On the other side of the amphora are two young naked horsemen, each carrying two spears. The subsidiary decoration includes a double lotus and palmette chain on the neck of the vase; an elaborate palmette cross under the handles; a band of alternately black and red tongues around the base of the neck; a band of rays around the base of the vase and an animal frieze below the figured area. The lid or cover of the amphora is circular and has a knob handle. It features four concentric circles and two rows of small hearts or leaves around the perimeter of the rim.

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Jean-Charles Develly (French, 1783-1862)(painter)
Sevres Royal Porcelain Manufactory (manufacturer, Sevres, Paris, France)
Plate, ‘Impression sur Etoffes: Teinture’, from the ‘Service des Arts Industriels’ (Industrial Arts Service), with a scene illustrating textile dyeing workshop in the Manufacture Royale de Jouy
1830
Hard paste porcelain
Height: 32 mm
Width: 240 mm
Depth: 240 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased 1993

Sevres plate with painted textile workshop scene

This unique plate belongs to a relatively small group of sumptuous tableware that survive today from the unique 173-piece dessert service known as ‘Service des Arts Industriels’ (industrial arts service). There were 108 plates in the service.

The Sevres Royal Porcelain Manufactory took 15 years to complete the set, which was never replicated. The service was presented by King Louis-Philippe to the Austrian chancellor Prince von Metternich in 1836. Later it belonged to the royal house of Romania.

The service is among the Sèvres factory’s most brilliant technological and artistic achievements. It was made from true (hard-paste) porcelain and its scenes are painted with newly developed pigments that produced colours as richly toned as in oil paintings. These were developed under Alexandre Brongniart (1770-184), the Sèvres factory’s director. The scenes were painted by Jean-Charles Develly who based them on his sketches drawn entirely from life. This was a significant innovation as most services were decorated with subjects copied from engravings or paintings. The service celebrated the progress of technology as applied to different industries in France at the time. The choice of this unusual subject reflected the economic and political importance of a wide range of crafts and industries in France in the early 1800s. The scene decorating the well of this plate is entitled ‘Impression sur etoffes. Teinture.’ and depicts various activities in the textile dyeing workshop at the Manufacture Royale de Jouy in Josas (Yvelines).

The service is a late example of the Empire style in ceramics. The style was developed by the Sèvres factory under the patronage of Napoleon Bonaparte (1805-15) and was widely imitated by other European ceramic factories, remaining popular long after the defeat of Napoleon.

Eva Czernis-Ryl, 1993

References:
Pierre Ennès, ‘Four Plates from the Sèvres “Service des Arts Industriels” (1820 – 1835),’ Journal of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston 2 (1990): 89-106
Tamara Préaud, ‘Brongniart as Administrator,’ in The Sèvres Porcelain Manufactory: Alexandre Brongniart and the Triumph of Art and Industry, 1800-1847, ed. Derek E.Ostergard (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1997), 43-53.

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Biagio Barzotti (Italian, 1835-1908)(maker, Rome, Italy)
Roman Ruins
c. 1876
Mosaic panel, framed
Glass/gilt and stained wood/metal
Height: 1261 mm
Width: 2005 mm
Depth: 170 mm
Weight: 250 kg
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased 1948

This framed mosaic panel is entitled ‘Roman Ruins’. It was created by Biagio Barzotti (1835-1908) in Italy in about 1876 by means of a mosaic of coloured glass ‘tesserae’. Rome’s Forum was not completely excavated until the 1870s. Like the many ancient sites uncovered during the 1800s, its exposure increased interest in the classical past and inspired numerous artistic representations.

Thomas Hope (English born Holland, 1769-1831)(designer)
Settee, Regency Egyptian Revival style
c. 1802
Ebonised and gilt beech/bronze and gilt brass mounts/reproduction silk damask and trimmings
Height: 610 mm
Width: 1676 mm
Depth: 660 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased with the funds donated by the Patrons of the Powerhouse, 1987
Bronze lions reproduced courtesy of Lord Faringdon, Buscot Park, England
The assistance of George Levy, H Blairman & sons, London is gratefully acknowledged

Regency Egyptian Revival settee by Thomas Hope

This pair of armchairs and settee in the Egyptian Revival style were designed by the English Regency designer, Thomas Hope, as part of the furnishings for the Egyptian room of his grand Robert Adam-designed residence in Duchess Street, London. The house was created as a showpiece for Hope’s collection of antiquities, and featured themed rooms with suites of furniture designed by Hope to provide a suitable background for his collection of classical and neoclassical statuary and objets d’art. His Egyptian room was located on the first floor, which was intended to be opened ‘museum-like’ to the public.

Thomas Hope was born in Amsterdam in 1769 into a wealthy Dutch banking family of Scottish descent. He settled in England around 1796 after an exhaustive eight-year grand tour of the Mediterranean countries, including Egypt, Turkey, Greece and Italy. His work in the Egyptian style has various sources including inspiration from his own travels and publications such as V. Denon’s “Voyage dans la basse et la haute Egypte” of 1802. The entire suite and its placement within the Egyptian room is illustrated in a meticulous line drawing in Thomas Hope’s “Household Furniture and Interior Decoration” of 1807 (plate VIII), an exceptional publication which established Hope’s reputation as a designer of outstanding vision and influential style. The Museum’s armchairs and couch form half of the suite of seating furniture originally in the Egyptian room; the other half is presently owned by the Faringdon Collection Trust, Buscot Park, England.

The provenance of the Powerhouse Museum’s pieces is interesting. A businessman, Sir Alfred Ashbolt, brought the suite to Australia in 1924 when he returned to Hobart after a term in London as agent-general for Tasmania (1919-1924). The furniture had been sold from the Hope estate to a London antique dealer in 1917. The couch and chairs were sold again at auction in the 1940s by the family of Sir Alfred Ashbolt. From then on, knowledge about their significance and origin appears to have faded until the armchairs were acquired at a Sydney auction by the Powerhouse Museum in 1984, and the couch acquired three years later, in 1987.

Anne Watson, 1984

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Unknown maker (Japan, Edo period)
Suit of armour and horse tack, possibly insignia of samurai officer Koma Kaemon of Bizen clan
Possibly 1775
Textile/leather/wood/lacquer/metal/paper/fibre/hair
Height: 1430 mm
Width: 800 mm
Depth: 520 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased by the museum from Lawson’s auctioneers, Sydney, 1948

Unknown maker (Japan, Edo period)
Suit of armour and horse tack, possibly insignia of samurai officer Koma Kaemon of Bizen clan (detail)
Possibly 1775
Textile/leather/wood/lacquer/metal/paper/fibre/hair
Height: 1430 mm
Width: 800 mm
Depth: 520 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased by the museum from Lawson’s auctioneers, Sydney, 1948

Gelugpa school (China, Ming dynasty, Yongle reign)
Figures (2), Sino-Tibetan deities, Brahma and Chandra, from Vajrabhairava group
1403-1424 or Xuande reign, 1426-1435
Gilt copper alloy/wood
Height: 350 mm
Width: 320 mm
Depth: 135 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Presented to the New South Wales Collection of Applied Art by Dame Eadith Campbell Walker, 1927

Sino-Tibetan figures from Vajrabhairava group

Manifestations of Hindu deities (Brahma and Chandra), which would have originally formed part of a Vajrabhairava group.
(-1) Figure, Brahma, seated, single head with 6 faces and four arms.
(-2) Figure, Chandra, similar to (-1) but with single head and two arms.

These two gilt bronze Sino-Tibetan figures are part of a set of eight Hindu gods enshrined in a Tibetan Buddhist temple in Beijing in the 15th century. These two figures would have been fourth and sixth from the left: Brahma and Chandra. These were most likely imperially commissioned, given the scale and quality of the figures, and were made by Newari metal craftsman who moved to China from Kathmandu Valley. The figures would have decorated the base of a monumental image of the cosmic deity Vajrabhairava, the wrathful manifestation of the Buddhisattva Manjusuri, the god of knowledge and wisdom. He is an important meditational deity of the Gelukpas, the largest and most powerful Buddhist order in Tibet. His form is characterised by multiple heads, including a buffalo head, and multiple limbs. The propositions of the present attendant figure suggest that the original sculpture would have stood over five feet high, arguable marking it one of the most important early Buddhist images recorded. A large embroidered silk thangka (Tibetan Buddhist painting) of Vajrabhairava in the Jokhang temple demonstrates the actual convention, showing eight deities in order were Shiva, Vishnu, Indra, Brahma, Katikeya, Chandra, Surya and Gannesha.

Min-Jung Kim
Curator
Feb 2017

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Gelugpa school (China, Ming dynasty, Yongle reign)
Figures (2), Sino-Tibetan deities, Brahma and Chandra, from Vajrabhairava group (details)
1403-1424 or Xuande reign, 1426-1435
Gilt copper alloy/wood
Height: 350 mm
Width: 320 mm
Depth: 135 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Presented to the New South Wales Collection of Applied Art by Dame Eadith Campbell Walker, 1927

Charles Rennie Mackintosh (Scottish, 1868-1928)(designer, Glasgow, Scotland)
Chair, ‘Argyle’
1898-1899
Designed for the Argyle Street Tearooms, Glasgow, c. 1897
Height: 1370 mm
Width: 505 mm
Depth: 470 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased with funds donated by the Patrons of the Powerhouse, 1984

‘Argyle’ chair by Charles Rennie Mackintosh

This unusually high backed chair was designed by the Scottish architect, Charles Rennie Mackintosh for Catherine Cranston’s Argyle Street Tearooms in Glasgow around 1898-1899. The design for the furniture of the tearooms was the first major private commission of Mackintosh’s career. The Argyle chair was shown at the Eighth Exhibition of the Vienna Secession, Austria in 1900 where Mackintosh’s highly individual style strongly influenced and contributed to the development of work at the Wiener Werkstatte.

The attenuated lines and exaggerated height of its back anticipated many of Mackintosh’s later designs. It is the first of his high back chairs to feature the top rail as an emblematic iconic symbol. The back uprights support an enlarged oval headrest with a fretted stylised flying swallow shape. Mackintosh raised the height of the chairs in order that the furniture make a dramatic statement within the room.

Mackintosh’s concentration on the formal qualities of the furniture within the interior very much anticipated the spirit of 20th century modernism. Although he was not as appreciated at home as he was on the continent (he died in relative poverty in London in 1928), his architecture and design went on to be revered worldwide and is appreciated for forming an important bridge between the 19th and 20th centuries, and between England and continental Europe.

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Unknown maker (English)
Mourning brooch
c. 1870
Metal/human hair
Height: 50 mm
Width: 75 mm
Depth: 25 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Gift of Margaret Vella, 1995

Meticulously crafted from human hair about 1870, this brooch is an example of a practice which flourished in Europe for almost four centuries. Wearing finger-rings as a memento of a deceased relative or friend had been well established by the 1400s, but it was during the late 1700s that mourning jewellery became truly fashionable. Rings, brooches, bracelets and even earrings made from black-enamelled gold, jet and human hair were widely worn particularly in Britain and colonies including Australia.

Alongside a flourishing hair-jewellery industry that sprang up in the 1800s, self-help manuals provided patterns and instructions for braiding and plaiting of hair into jewellery at home. Sometimes seen as macabre, the keeping of the deceased relative’ s hair reflects a different sensibility from the modern sanitised view of death. Although most hair jewellery was intended for mourning, it was also made to celebrate love. Sadly, we don’ t know who wore this brooch. Though it was probably an expression of someone’ s grief, it could also have been intended as a token of love as the hair appears to have belonged to two people. It was made at a time when the fashion for hair jewellery was fading.

Eva Czernis-Ryl, Curator, 2020

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Ken + Julia Yonetani (Katoomba, New South Wales, Australia)
Chandelier, ‘USA’
2013
From art installation Crystal Palace: The Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nuclear Nations
Uranium glass/UV lights/metal
Height: 2000 mm
Width: 1600 mm
Weight: 80 kg
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased with funds donated through the annual appeal and from the MAAS Foundation, 2016

‘USA’ Chandelier by Ken + Julia Yonetani

The chandelier is part of an installation created in response to the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster. There are 31 chandeliers in the installation, each representing a country with nuclear power stations. Their sizes correspond to the nuclear capacity in that country, with the USA chandelier being the largest. All chandeliers are densely covered with specially sourced uranium glass beads and feature uranium glass crystal pendants. When lit in darkness, the ultraviolet light tubes react with the uranium inside the glass to create a fluorescent green effect, reminiscent of the presence of radiation. (Uranium glass contains very small traces of uranium and poses no health risks).

Working with a thrilling variety of conventional and unconventional materials including sugar and salt, Ken (b. 1971, Tokyo) who is Japanese with Australian residency, and his Australian partner Julia (b. 1972, Tokyo) are among the most creative contemporary artists emerging on the international art scene today. They explore environmental concerns through powerful installations such as the ‘Sweet Barrier Reef’ which comments on the effects of climate change and was first shown at the 2009 Venice Biennale. Other international shows include an installation at the 2013 Singapore Biennale and a major solo exhibition at the Abbey de Maubuisson in Paris in 2015.

The Yonetanis divide their time between Australia and Japan. The Fukushima plant accident had a profound effect on the artists and this installation explores their deeply-felt sense of fear associated with the impacts of radiation. Inspired by the world’s first large-scale international expo, the 1851 Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations, the artists have created a provocative statement on our accelerating seduction with nuclear technology and power. Eerily beautiful, they mesmerise the viewer with the chandeliers’ magical presence while also posing timely questions. The artists explain: ‘You can’t see, smell or perceive radiation with your senses, but it becomes visible in our works when illuminated with ultraviolet lights… We hope to prompt viewers to react in their own way to this radioactive presence.’ (Interview, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra 2016)

In the MAAS context, this multi-media artwork highlights this Museum’s own history and its interlinked arts, design and technology collections: MAAS was modelled on London’s South Kensington Museum (now The Victoria & Albert Museum), a direct result of the Great Exhibition. This Museum also originated as a response to the 1879 Sydney International Exhibition, the first world’s fair in the southern hemisphere.

Eva Czernis-Ryl, Curator, 2016

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Installation view of the exhibition 1,001 Remarkable Objects at Powerhouse Ultimo, Sydney showing numerous examples of Australian colonial silver in the Powerhouse Collection including at centre, Evan Jones’ Inkstand, seated emu form (c. 1875, below)

Evan Jones (Australian born England)(Sydney, New South Wales, Australia)
Inkstand, seated emu form (installation view)
c. 1875
Silver gilt/emu egg shell/glass/wood
Height: 350 mm
Width: 400 mm
Depth: 260 mm
Weight: 6.5 kg
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased 1984

Silver Gilt Emu Inkstand by Evan Jones

This inkstand is the only one of its kind known to have been made in colonial Australia. It is a fine example of Australian-made presentation pieces bought or commissioned from silversmiths working in gold-rush Australia between the late 1850s and the depression of the early 1890s. Before that time, presentation silver was imported, mostly from England. From the late 1850s, newly arrived immigrant silversmiths from England, Ireland and continental Europe could more than satisfactorily meet the growing demand for silver or gold testimonials and sporting trophies. They developed a uniquely Australian style using Australian motifs such as the emu and kangaroo, and incorporating local materials, particularly the vivid-green emu egg and Australian malachite that provided such a striking contrast to polished silver.

This inkstand is one of the most impressive works made by Evan Jones, a leading silversmith in late colonial Sydney. Born in England, Jones worked as silversmith, watchmaker, medallist and jeweller in Sydney between about 1873 and 1917. At the age of twelve Jones became an apprentice at Hardy Brothers, and he later gained experience at the renowned firm of Hogarth, Erichsen & Co, and with Christian L Qwist. His business was first listed in the Sydney Directory in 1873 at 15 Hunter Street, a former address of Qwist. He established several branches in the city in the 1890s, but his principal workshop was in Erskine Street.

Evan Jones frequently exhibited in colonial and international exhibitions. It was reported, for example, that in the Sydney International Exhibition of 1879, Australia’s first, he showed “emu’s eggs …mounted in 101 different ways”. Jones also produced gold and silver racing cups, rowing and sculling trophies, and decorative tableware including spectacular silver epergnes (table centrepieces) with Australian motifs. His modelling skills in silver can be best appreciated in this marvellous sculptural inkstand made about 1875.

Eva Czernis-Ryl, curator, June 2007

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Installation view of the exhibition 1,001 Remarkable Objects at Powerhouse Ultimo, Sydney showing William Kerr’s Presentation trowel (c. 1883, below)

William Kerr (Australian born Ireland, 1838-1896)(maker, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia)
Presentation trowel (installation view)
c. 1883
Used by Lizzie Henrietta Harris to lay the foundation stone of the Great Hall of Sydney Town Hall, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, 1883
Silver/gold/ivory
Width: 97 mm
Depth: 53 mm
Weight: 283.5 g
Powerhouse Collection
Donated through the Australian Government’s Cultural Gifts Program by John Atkinson, 2006

Presentation trowel used in laying the foundation stone of Sydney Town Hall

This trowel was used in laying the foundation stone of the Great Hall of Sydney Town Hall on 13 November 1883.

It relates to the history of a prominent Sydney family. Lizzie Henrietta Harris, to whom the trowel was presented by aldermen of the city, was wife of John Harris, Mayor of Sydney. Their daughter Mary Ann was herself Mayoress of Sydney in 1888 and 1889, during the five terms in which her father was Mayor.

It was made in the workshop of William Kerr (1838-1896), a leading watchmaker, jeweller and silversmith in Sydney in late 19th century. Today, Kerr is mostly remembered for his distinctive silver trophies, three of them receiving an award at Australia’s first International Exhibition which took place in Sydney in 1879. Kerr’s work was commended for ‘tasteful design’ and ‘careful workmanship’.

William Kerr was born in Northern Ireland and came to Australia on board of the ‘New York Packet’ with his family in 1841. Kerr obtained many important commissions for presentation pieces, like this trowel, often from the Sydney City Council. Recognising the importance of sporting life in Australia, Kerr also sponsored clubs which gave him a steady stream of orders. He used Australian motifs, mostly plants and animals, in his distinctive, finely worked pieces.

The striking design and execution as well as the original condition of the trowel, which is applied with Australian flowers crafted in gold, make it an outstanding item of Australian metalwork of the period. It is the only example of its kind known to have been made and survived.

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

William Edwards (Australian born England, c. 1819 – c. 1889)(maker)
Kilpatrick & Co (retailer est. 1853, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia)
Inkstand with kangaroo and emu motifs, gold and silver, presented to John Todd by Thomas Bibby Guest
1865
Gold and silver
Height: 245 mm
Width: 320 mm
Depth: 190 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased with the assistance of Silvanus Gladstone Evans bequest, 1986

Inkstand with Kangaroo and Emu Motifs by William Edwards

Only twenty four significant examples of Australian-made secular presentation pieces crafted in gold are known to have survived from the colonial period; almost eighty are known to have been made. This unique inkstand is one of the most striking, particularly in its use of sculptural elements and Australian iconography. Fashioned in silver and almost pure gold, it was made in the workshop of William Edwards (c. 1819 -c. 1889) in Melbourne in 1865 and retailed by Kilpatrick & Co (est. 1853). The son of a London silversmith and a manufacturing silversmith, Edwards came to Australia in 1857. Until about 1872 he ran a business in Melbourne which supplied silverware to major retailers; some objects were imported from the family business in London. From about 1873 Edwards was in partnership with Alexander Kaul.

William Edwards’ workshop excelled in the production of silver-mounted emu egg trophies and is credited with making the earliest surviving piece, the covered cup presented in 1859 to a Melbourne University scholar by his students (also in this Museum’s collection). Although silver-mounted emu eggs form the largest surviving body of Edward’s output, his workshop also produced a number of silver and occasionally gold trophies and epergnes, some of which were displayed in international exhibitions. Edwards was also responsible for major commissions such as the gifts for Prince Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh which subsequently brought him an appointment as goldsmith and jeweller the the Duke’s household.

The majority of the firm’s wares were designed in the naturalistic and rococo revival styles. From the early 1860s, classical revival motifs and forms began appearing, often in combination with rococo and sometimes gothic elements. Regency detailing, evident in the design of the base of this inkstand, was rare. Also well known are Edward’s silver claret jugs of the 1860s, which were made in many variations including richly repoussed pieces and even emu and ostrich egg versions.

Thomas Bibby Guest was a steam biscuit manufacturer in William Street in Melbourne who succumbed to the lure of the goldfields in about 1857 and ‘made a considerable sum of money in mining [and] … lost most of it’. John Todd, his English business associate, helped Guest by sending the latest biscuit-making machinery on credit which enabled Guest “to produce such a quality that no one else could & by this means I have got back my lost trade, & my returns… more than trebled & still go on increasing” ( TB Guest & Co, papers, University of Melbourne Archives, 1875). The loan was repaid in full in August 1865, when the inkstand was delivered to Todd in Manchester. Guest’s biscuit works were relocated to North Melbourne in 1897, and in 1900 the business was converted into a proprietary company. Guest died on 3 April 1908 as ‘a man of exceptional business capacity, and his enterprise in starting a new industry so early, earned him the esteem and respect of his fellow colonists.” (‘Age’, 4 April 1908, p. 17). John Todd died in Manchester in 1875, and the fate of his inkstand, until it was located in 1986 in England and purchased by the Powerhouse Museum, is unknown. The original invoice for the inkstand, for 100 pounds, dated 11 April 1865 and made out to TB Guest still survives in the University of Melbourne Archives.

Eva Czernis-Ryl, September 2007

Recommended further reading:
C Thompson, ‘Substantial evidence of your gratitude… A silver and gold presentation inkstand by William Edwards, Melbourne, 1865’, Australiana, August 1987, pp 91-95.

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Installation views of the exhibition 1,001 Remarkable Objects at Powerhouse Ultimo, Sydney showing examples of 19th century Australian gold jewellery in the Powerhouse Collection including at top, a parure comprising necklace, locket and earrings (pair), gold/operculum by F Allerding & Son, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, 1879-1884 (below); and at second top centre, Bangle, ‘Soyons toujours unis / Par un divin amour’, 18 carat gold, Henry Steiner, Adelaide, South Australia, c. 1878 (below)

F Allerding & Son (maker, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia)
Necklace from a parure which includes locket and earrings (pair) (installation view)
1879-1884
Gold/operculum
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased, 1994

Operculum and Gold Parure by F Allerding & Son

This parure is probably the finest known surviving example of gold-mounted operculum jewellery made (and fully marked) in colonial Australia. Among the more unusual materials used in 19th century jewellery in Australia were shells of many varieties- nautilus, trigonia mother of pearl and operculum, the shell valve of the mouth of a sea-snail shell, which, when polished, resembles a ‘cat’s eye’. A fine necklace of operculum mounted in gold was shown by F Allerding & Son at the Sydney International Exhibition in 1879, alongside some examples by other Sydney jewellers: Evan Jones, William Kerr and Hippoyte Delarue.

F. Allerding & Son were jewellers and scientific instrument retailers who operated from 25 Hunter Street in Sydney. Friederich Allerding had been operating a shop in Hunter Street from as early as 1863 and around 1879 changed the name to incorporate his son Henry into the business. The firm’s name was changed to Allerding F. & Co. around 1892 and Henry continued to operate the business into the early 1900s.

Allerding was obviously well regarded by the local scientists in Sydney as he was invited by H. C. Russell, the Government Astronomer, to participate in the observation of the 1874 Transit of Venus. Allerding viewed the transit from the back-yard of his Hunter Street business and this is recorded in Russell’s book on the Transit observations. This books also refers to the fact that Allerding at this time was listed as a ‘chronometer maker’ although it appears more likely that he was a retailer of imported chronometers. This was not uncommon for the maker whose name is on the instrument typically organised for the parts to be brought together and supervised the final stages of its construction such as ‘springing’ or adjusting the mechanism. However the company also specialised in jewellery making and at the Sydney International Exhibition in 1879 were commended ‘for skilful workmanship and good quality of gold and shell jewellery’. Designed in the style popular in England particularly in the late 1870s and 1880s, this the finest example of Allerding’s parure work known to exist.

Eva Czernis-Ryl and Geoff Barker, Curatorial, 2007-2008

Further reading:
A.Schofield, ‘Materials used in 19th century Australian jewellery’, The Australian Antique Collector, April-October 1996, pp. 157-159.

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Henry Steiner (Australian born Germany, 1835-1914)(maker, Adelaide, South Australia)
Bangle, ‘Soyons toujours unis / Par un divin amour’ (installation view)
c. 1878
18 carat gold
Height: 32 mm
Width: 59 mm
Depth: 68 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased 1988

Gold Bangle by Henry Steiner

Only a small number of substantial, fully marked gold jewellery crafted in colonial Australia has survived and this rare bangle is one such work. Its significance is further enhanced by its believed association with the Paris Universal Exposition of 1878 where Steiner in known to have exhibited jewellery. This piece is one of Steiner’s finest. Meticulously crafted and decorated with a lavish French inscription, the bangle was most likely made for the Paris Universal Exposition of 1878 where Steiner exhibited.

Born in Bremen, Germany in 1835, Johann Henry Steiner arrived in Australia about 1858 and was first listed in the South Australian Almanac in 1864. While Steiner is best known for his silver presentation pieces (including silver-mounted emu eggs) often decorated with Australian flora and fauna, he also supplied a wide range of gold jewellery in Adelaide between 1864 and 1884, when he sold the business to August Brunkhorst, another German-born jeweller and silversmith. Steiner exhibited at a number of international exhibitions in Australia and overseas, receiving a first degree of merit in Sydney in 1879. Alongside J M Wendt, Henry Steiner was also a leading retailer of other silversmiths’ work in Adelaide.

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Unknown maker (English)
Diamond brooch in the form of a bee with sapphires on his head and in stripes across his body and with ruby eyes
1860-1870
Gold/diamonds/sapphires/rubies

Tooth & Co Ltd (Sydney, New South Wales, Australia)
Advertising signage (1 of 5), white horse rampant (installation view)
c. 1930s
Plaster
Height: 610 mm
Width: 188 mm
Depth: 433 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Acquired 1986

Installation views of the exhibition 1,001 Remarkable Objects at Powerhouse Ultimo, Sydney showing in the foreground, Figure, ‘Peacock’, earthenware with majolica glazes, modelled by Paul Comolera, made by Mintons, Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire, England, c. 1873-1875

Florence Broadhurst (Australian, 1899-1977)(designer)
Florence Broadhurst Wallpapers Pty Ltd (maker, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia)
Wallpaper roll, ‘Peacocks’ design (installation view)
1969-1977
Polyester/paper
Width: 758 mm

Wallpaper roll, ‘Peacocks’ design by Florence Broadhurst Wallpapers

Florence Broadhurst perceived her ‘Peacocks’ wallpaper as one of her best mature works. It became a ‘signature’ piece when Florence posed in front of it for her business advertisements in the 1970s. Sydney identities used the design in their homes, including Jill Wran and her husband Neville Wran, former Premier of NSW.

The full set of screens required to print the original ‘Peacocks’ design were acquired into the Museum’s collection in 1997 (97/322/2). Unused lengths or rolls of the ‘Peacocks’ wallpaper are extremely rare. This length was acquired opportunistically by the donor who purchased it from a local St Vincent de Paul outlet.

Florence Broadhurst is most renowned in Australia for her Sydney-based wallpaper business. As well as being a business woman, wallpaper and textile designer, Florence also had earlier careers as an artist (painter), dress consultant/designer and performer (singer and banjolele player). Born in Mt Perry, Queensland in 1899, she died in Sydney during 1977.

She established Australian (Hand Printed) Wallpapers Pty Ltd in St Leonards in 1959 moving to 12-24 Roylston Street, Paddington in 1969. She then changed the name of the business to Florence Broadhurst Wallpapers Pty Ltd advertising it as ‘the only studio of its kind in the world’. With the aid of a small number of production, office and design staff, Florence designed, manufactured and single-handedly marketed, locally-produced high quality, hand-crafted wallpapers with luxurious, oversized patterns in vivid combinations of psychedelic colours. The designs were drawn from, and inspired by, an eclectic range of sources. The colourful peacock, along with bold geometric, stripe and floral designs printed on metallic papers, became hallmark designs.

As well as being renowned for her flamboyant wallpapers, Florence was also a Sydney personality. With her vibrant personality she represented many charitable and fund raising organisations and committees, in particular those associated with the manifestation of memorable public occasions such as grand fund-raising balls for which Florence occasionally prepared elaborate festive decorations. …

Anne-Marie Van de Ven, Curator June 2002

Locally Broadhurst’s reputation hinges on her vibrant personality and her renowned and flamboyant wallpapers. She established Australian (Hand Printed) Wallpapers Pty Ltd in 1959 in premises behind her husband’s trucking business, L. Lewis & Son Pty. Ltd., 466 Pacific Highway, St. Leonards, Sydney. With the aid of a small number of production, office and design staff, she set out to design, manufacture and single-handedly market, locally-produced high quality, hand-crafted wallpapers with luxurious, oversized patterns in vivid combinations of psychedelic colours, often on metallic surfaces – the designs inspired by an eclectic range of sources. Brightly coloured peacocks became a hallmark piece, along with bold geometric, stripe and floral designs. Innovations included printing onto metallic surfaces, developing a washable vinyl coating finish and installing a drying rack system that allowed her wallpapers to be produced in large quantities.

Florence moved Australian (Hand Printed) Wallpapers to 12-24 Roylston Street, Paddington on 1 July, 1969. The company then became known as Florence Broadhurst Wallpapers Pty Ltd, advertising as ‘ the only studio of its kind in the world’ and ‘exporting to America, England, Hawaii, Kuwait, Peru, Norway, Paris, and Oslo’. In 1972, the Australia News and Information Bureau issued a press release titled ‘Australian Designer has international reputation’. By the mid 1970s, Florence Broadhurst Wallpapers reportedly contained around 800 designs in 80 different colour ways. With her eyesight and hearing failing, Florence flew to the United Kingdom to attend a Cell Therapy Clinic in 1973 in the hope of improving her health and rejuvenating her body. Four years later, she was brutally murdered on Saturday, 15 October 1977 in her Paddington premises. Her body was not discovered until the morning of Sunday 16 October. The murderer has never been convicted. Florence was cremated at Sydney’s Northern Suburbs Crematorium.

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Installation views of the exhibition 1,001 Remarkable Objects at Powerhouse Ultimo, Sydney showing in the background, Painting, ‘Althouse & Geiger / Sign Writers, Painters, Decorators’, glass / oil / gold leaf, designed and made by Althouse and Geiger Pty Ltd, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, 1895-1905; and in the foreground Chair, reproduction, based on Lucien Henry, ‘Lyrebird’ or ‘staghorn fern’ design, jelutong & kauri timber / gesso finish / needlework, made by International Conservation Services Pty Ltd, Australia, 2000

International Conservation Services Pty Ltd (maker, Australia)
Chair, reproduction, based on Lucien Henry, ‘Lyrebird’ or ‘staghorn fern’ design (installation view)
2000
Jelutong & kauri timber/gesso finish/needlework
Height: 979 mm
Width: 500 mm
Depth: 470 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased 2000

Reproduction chair based on ‘Lyrebird’ or ‘Staghorn Fern’ Design by Lucien Henry

Lucien Felix Henry was born in 1850 in Provence, in the south of France. He arrived in Paris to study art in 1867 and was accepted into Gerome’s studio at the Ecoles des Beaux Arts. His studies were disrupted by the Franco-Prussian War and the siege of Paris. He played a leading role in the popular movement to defend the Paris Commune in 1871 as Chef de la Legion, responsible for the defence of the 14th arrondissement. After their defeat, Henry, along with some 4000 other Communards, was incarcerated in the French penal colony of New Caledonia for seven years. In 1879 the Communards were given amnesty and Henry arrived in Sydney.

That year the International Exhibition was held in Sydney, ushering in a decade of prosperous growth for the colony. Henry successfully argued for state involvement in art education and by the end of the decade he had become a widely respected teacher and artist at Sydney Technical College. His Parisian art education had encouraged interdisciplinary work between the arts and industry which he sought to foster locally. Coinciding with the movement towards federation, Henry expressed a strong desire to see the development of an ‘Australian Style’. Henry proposed to reinvigorate the classical language of decoration with stylised versions of Australian flora and fauna as ‘motives for the decoration of any construction from a cottage to a public building’. His major project was to be a book entitled ‘Australian Decorative Arts’ for which he made some one hundred watercolour designs between 1889-91. In 1891 Henry returned to Paris to seek a publisher. The accompanying text, however, remained largely unwritten and the severe economic depression of the 1890s made publication of such a lavish work impossible. Henry died in 1896 before the book could be published.

The watercolour designs from the unpublished book were given to the Museum in 1911 by Elizabeth Catherine Sea. These designs reflect Henry’s intense interest in the use of native motifs, and in particular explore what Henry argued was the artistic potential of the waratah. Henry wrote that the waratah’s ‘rigid lines offer themselves ready for use for constructive ornamentation…it carries qualities of style and a firmness such as very few flowers, if any, could give so abundantly.’ The illustrations were championed at the time of acquisition by the Museum’s director, R T Baker, who shared Henry’s interest in the potential of Australian imagery to define a distinctively Australian school of decorative art. Baker described Henry as ‘an artist possessing real genius, and his originality in design and other fields of fine and Applied Art will live long in the annals of New South Wales technical education’. However, the illustrations were subsequently overlooked for half a century until they were rediscovered in a storeroom in 1977.

In 2000, the Powerhouse Museum commissioned International Conservation Services to realise Lucien Henry’s ‘Lyrebird chair’ from full-size computer designs based on his three elevations. Vladimir Tsourkan carved the lyrebird, rising sun and staghorn fern on the reverse from jelutong timber on a kauri and hoop-pine frame. Tessa Evans made the needlework seat from Henry’s circular design. henry’s designs in their vernacular interpretation of classicism suggest a local version of the Neo-Grec style, popular when he was a student at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in the late 1860s. As few of his designs were realised the reproduction chair provides an excellent opportunity to display henry’s innovative and witty combination of European style with local materials. Such hybrid forms give expression to the diverse forces that have shaped Australian culture.

Henry relished the possibility of transforming native flora and fauna into decorative forms. As an instructor in art at Sydney Technical College, he championed their use in the decorative arts, design and architecture. His own work draws on the shapes and forms of Australian native plants as the basis of his designs, as reflected in his design for the ‘Lyrebird/staghorn fern’ chair.

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Unknown maker (English)
Court dress, comprising open robe, petticoat, length of fabric and galloon (2)
c. 1760
Silk brocade
Height: 1650 mm
Width: 1470 mm
Depth: 1220 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Gift of Nadine Turner through the Australian Costume and Textile Society, 1985

Court dress of silk brocade

The robe à la française or sack-back open robe was the most popular and lasting dress style for the fashionable women in the 18th century. So named for its association with the French court at Versailles and for the loose double box pleat of drapery that falls down the back from the shoulders. The gown is slipped on like a coat and is open at the front to reveal a matching petticoat and a triangular shaped bodice piece (which covers the corset) called the stomacher. Stomachers were usually pinned or tied in place and could be in a different fabric or match the rest of the open-robe like this one.

For much of the 18th century women’s fashionable dress featured an exaggerated wide-hipped silhouette which displayed the beautiful and costly silk fabrics to full advantage. This dress features a cream silk fabric which has been brocaded in silver thread with a design of bows, ribbons and flowers. Enhancing its sumptuous appearance is an applied border of metallic bobbin lace. It was probably worn for grand occasions like attendance at court. Although the basic construction of the sack gown remained relatively unchanged, the design of fabrics changed yearly.

The exaggerated shape was achieved by layers of foundation garments including linen stays stiffened with whalebone and a hoop shaped with insertions of cane or whalebone to create a pannier effect at the sides of the garment. At a time when baths were not a daily occurrence layers of washable linen kept the costly silks away from the skin. Accessories were an important part of the total look and would include a fan, high-heeled shoes and a powdered wig.

The sack-back robe was in origin a more informal negligee gown but by the mid 1700s was worn at court and formal occasions. While women’s dress changed dramatically in style in the last quarter of the 18th century these lavish panniered dresses continued to be worn as formal court dress into the early 19th century. The provenance accompanying this dress suggested it may have been worn by Lady Collingwood.

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Gabrielle Chanel (French, 1883-1971)(designer, Paris, France)
Evening dress, womens, spring-summer 1939
1939
Silk/ostrich feather
Height: 1550 mm
Width: 500 mm
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased 1996

Chanel Evening Dress with Stole

Over the four decades that Gabrielle Chanel worked in haute couture she created many diverse styles of dress. She was known in the 1920s for her cardigan suits or sheath-like dresses and the 1950s and early 1960s when her braid trimmed, English tweed suits fastened with gilt buttons, became the default uniform for many affluent matrons.

Arguably, Chanel’s designs from the 1930s are less recognisable yet it was a period when the designer produced some of her most interesting work such as this full-length evening dress from the Chanel Spring 1939 collection. This strapless dress, made from a fine lightweight plain silk weave printed with a painterly feather motif in cyclamen, green, blue and yellow on a black ground, features cut-outs of the individual feather designs with meticulously oversewn edges, adorning the surface of the print, bringing the two-dimensional design to life. Chanel’s clothes were not usually known for their wit yet this effect, heightened with the use of dyed ostrich feathers around the bodice is a playful nod to Surrealist art of the 1930s.

Roger Leong, Senior Curator, 2016

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Catherine Martin (Australian, b. 1965)(designer)
Bazmark workrooms (maker, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia)
Headpiece by Rosie Boylan (maker, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia)
Performance costumes (2), ‘Fruity Mambo’, mens and womens, for ‘Strictly Ballroom The Musical’
2014
Lycra/leather/suede/cotton/synthetic/metal/plastic
Powerhouse Collection

Luke Sales and Anna Plunkett of Romance Was Born (designer and maker, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia)
Outfit, ‘Iced Vo Vo’, comprising of dress and shoes (pair), womens, Doilies and Pearls, Oysters and Shells collection, spring-summer 2009/2010
2009
Textile/metal/leather
Powerhouse Collection
Purchased 2010

‘Iced VoVo’ Outfit by Romance Was Born

The Iced VoVo dress by fashion design label Romance Was Born is an eccentric and cheeky take on an iconic Australian biscuit. Larrikin designers, Anna Plunkett and Luke Sales are famous for their portrayal of Australian kitsch and use of traditional craft techniques. Shown at Rosemount Australian Fashion Week, Spring/Summer 2009/2010 as part of the Doilies and Lace collection it was widely covered by both newspapers and magazine. Flamboyant and whimsical the collection included everything from a crochet dress, octopus hats and a budgie inspired dress. Their clothes have graced the cover of Australian Vogue and in 2009 they won the Woolmark Young Designer Award.

Anna Plunkett and Luke Sales met and became firm friends while studying at The Fashion Design Studio, Sydney Institute of Technology. After graduation they were selected to attend The Fourth International Support Awards in Italy where they famously turned down an invitation to intern with John Galliano designer for fashion house Dior. The pair had other plans for their designs and launched their label, Romance Was Born shortly after. Inspired by iconic 1980’s Australian designers Linda Jackson and Jenny Kee they are in Luke’s own words, ‘obsessed’! This influence can be seen through the use of bright eclectic prints, collaboration with Indigenous Australian artist, Esme Timbery and a recurring Australian theme. The duo have also collaborated with artist Del Kathryn Barton and high street fashion store Sportsgirl. They have dressed musicians Karen O of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Cindy Lauper, Bat For Lashes, Debbie Harry, Lilly Allen, MIA, the Presets and Architecture in Helsinki. Australian actress and Academy Award winner, Cate Blanchett has also worn their designs.

This Iced VoVo dress is significant as an example of unique and original contemporary Australian fashion design. It represents Australian themes in a playful manner and was one of the most talked about and acclaimed collections at Rosemount Australian Fashion Week, Spring/Summer 2009/2010. Anna Plunkett and Luke Sales are among the most creative and challenging Australian design teams to emerge in the last decade.

Assistant Curator, Rebecca Evans. March 2010.

Text from the Powerhouse Collection website

Powerhouse Ultimo
500 Harris Street,
Ultimo NSW 2007

Opening hours:
Daily 10am – 5pm

Powerhouse Ultimo website

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Photographs: Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)

November 2023

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Rue Saint-Médard, 5e arrondissement
1899-1900
Albumen print

I am devastated at news of the loss of a very close friend today.

An intelligent, compassionate, creative and spiritual man who was a guiding light during the last 33 years of my life.

He said of Atget, “You always have a sense of feeling self surprised at where his camera is.”

Atget was always an inspiration to us both.

Bless him for his wise counsel all these years.

A tribute will appear at a later time.

Dr Marcus Bunyan

Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.

Again

Why are the waves,
Coming straight at me?
Fold upon fold
Waves in wind –
And why is the wind
Becoming my breath,
And my breath, the wind?

So now you
Beautiful friend
Breathe my friend
Jump the wave,
Jump up, laughing
The sun right above you,
Here on the coast
Among waves and trees.

Enter your home
Like a nest
Beautiful friend,
Dear friend,
Read till you sleep –
Your breath on the pages
That tell of the road and
On that road where you meet
Those twilight lit:
One, two,
Then three again.

“His prints are direct and emotionally clean records of a rare and subtle perception, and represent perhaps the earliest expression of true photographic art.”

Ansel Adams

“There is nothing I could ask for better than to roll myself between sheets of Atgets, each new one I find (and there are thousands) is a revelation.”

Julien Levy

“In looking at the work of Eugène Atget, a new world is opened up in the world of creative expression.”

Berenice Abbott

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Soleil
c. 1896

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Fontaine Jarente – impasse Jarente (Fountain Jarente – Jarente dead end)
1898
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Fontaine Minerve, Institut (Minerva Fountain, Institute)
1899
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Hôtel de la Comtess de Verrue, rue du Regard
1899
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Avenue de l’Observatoire
1899-1900
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Hôtel de Gouffier, rue de Varenne 56
1899-1900
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Cactus [Nice]
Before 1900
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Cour, rue Saint-Jacques 346, disparu, 5e arrondissement (Court, rue Saint-Jacques 346)
1900
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Hôtel d’Argouges de Lyon, rue Séguier 16
1900
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Presbytère de Saint-Sulpice, rue de Vaugirard 50 (Presbytery of Saint-Sulpice)
1900
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Marché aux fleurs (Flower market)
c. 1900s
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Cours d’Honneur, Versailles (Gentilly – old castle, Versailles)
1901
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Gentilly – ancien château
1901
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Hôtel Beauffremont, rue de Grenelle 87
1901
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Hôtel du Maréchal de Tallard, rue des Archives 78
1901-1902
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Grand Trianon Le Buffet
1902
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
La Vénus accroupie, par Coysevox (Versailles) (The Crouching Venus, by Coysevox, (Versailles))
1902
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Versailles – l’Orangerie
1903
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Oratoire Marie de Médicis, Petit Luxembourg (Marie de Medici Oratory)
1903
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Fontaine du Marché Saint-Honoré (Saint-Honoré Market Fountain)
1903
Albumen print

Atget used a view camera with a bellows placed on a tripod, typical of the second half of the 19th century. He worked with 18 × 24 cm negative glass plates, oriented to obtain either a vertical or horizontal photograph. A tilt-shift technique was used to make perspective corrections. This resulted in vignetting (a circular shadow around the edges of the image), a phenomenon seen in a number of Atget’s photographs.

Atget always used gelatin-silver negative glass plates, 1.5mm thick. The plate was held in the camera in a wooden frame by clips that left characteristic marks on many of the prints. A long exposure time resulted in numerous blurs caused by the presence of moving people or objects. Atget developed the negatives himself and wrote the negative number directly onto the gelatin with a pointed stiletto.

Atget made all of his own photographic prints using a technique in which light-sensitive paper, in contact with the glass negative, was printed-out in natural light (never developed). The printing-out process proceeded until Atget determined that the image had the proper density. The photograph was then washed, gold toned, fixed and washed again. Atget’s prints are never black-and-white; their tone varies from deep sepia to violet-brown. Atget was capable of producing high-quality prints but there is great variation in these today depending on his printing and toning techniques and the way his photographs were preserved and exhibited. He never enlarged his photographs.

Atget’s paper

Atget used three types of paper:

Albumen

The light-sensitive emulsion was formed by silver chloride introduced into an albumen binder (beaten egg whites). The majority of Atget’s prints were on albumen paper. He turned to other processes after the First World War, when such paper could no longer be found on the market.

Matt albumen

After the war Atget used another kind of industrially produced printing-out paper with a matt surface.

Aristotype

Atget chose a commercially manufactured printing-out paper made with gelatin. Aesthetically similar to albumen prints, although thicker and with a glossier surface, the process was the same for toning and printing. Some of these prints have yellow stains from sulphuration due to poor processing of the image (such as the use of an exhausted fixing bath or insufficient washing).

Anonymous. “Atget’s technique,” on the Art Gallery of New South Wales website Nd [Online] Cited 03/10/2023

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Fontaine, rue Geoffrey Saint-Hilaire
1905
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Grand Trianon (escalier) (Grand Trianon (staircase))
1905
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Saint-Severin – rue Saint Séverin
1905-1906
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Grand Trianon – le Buffet
1906
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Maison, rue Saint-Romain [Rouen]
1907
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Nantes – fontaine et Mairie (Nantes – fountain and town hall)
1907
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Tuileries – Coureuse par Coustou (Tuileries – Runner by Coustou)
1907
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Hôtel d’Imbercourt, 15 rue de l’Universite
1909
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Folie Thoinard, 9 rue Coq-Héron
1909
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Façade Saint-Lazare, faubourg Saint-Denis 107
1909
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Hôtel de Vendôme, rue Béranger 3
1909
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Pommiers [et blés] (Apple trees [and wheat])
1910 or earlier
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Sapin ([Petit] Trianon)
1910 or earlier
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Colonne Moris (Place Saint Sulpice) (Morris Column (Place Saint Sulpice))
1910
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Hôtel de Canhillac, place des Vosges 14
1911-1912
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Fontaine, faubourg Saint-Martin (Fountain, Saint-Martin suburb)
1912
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Balcon, [15] rue du Petit Pont
1913
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Pavilion du Hanovre, boulevard des Capucines 33
1913
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Fête du Trône
1914
Albumen print

“My excitement at seeing these few photographs would not let me rest. Who was this man? I learned that Atget lived up the street from where I worked – at 17 bis rue Campagne Premiere, and that his prints were for sale. Perhaps I could own some. I wanted to see more, and lost no time in seeking him out. I mounted the four flights to his fifth floor apartment. On the door was a modest handmade sign, “Documents pour Artistes”. He ushered me into a room approximately fifteen feet long, the ordinary room of a small apartment, sparsely and simply furnished. Atget, slightly stooped, impressed me as being tired, sad, remote, appealing. He was not talkative. He did not try to “sell” anything. He showed me some albums, which he had made himself, and I selected as many prints as I could afford to pay for from my meager wages as a photographer’s assistant. I returned many times, and we became more friendly.” Several years passed and Berenice Abbott became a portrait photographer. “By that time I had become a portrait photographer on my own, and I persuaded Atget to come to my studio at 44 rue du Bac to sit for his portrait. To my surprise he arrived in a handsome overcoat. I had always seen him in his patched work clothes. It would have been desirable to photograph him in these too, since they were exquisitely photogenic, but time is a fickle unpredictable master and did not permit another sitting. After developing the portraits she took the images to show Atget. Abbott missed the sign and made one more flight of stairs to find the concierge.” She asked about Atget and was shocked to hear that he had died. “Youth is little equipped to accept or even anticipate the fact of death. And I had just finished his portraits.” Inquiring about his collection of photographs, she found that they had been left to Andre Calmette. It took months of correspondence and convincing, but she eventually acquired Atget’s entire collection. Abbott also wrote a book about Atget and published many of his prints. Many critics have attacked Atget’s work, saying Atget was merely a disappointed painter or actor, and a little ashamed of his medium. Claims have been made that Atget did not really know what he was doing, that reflections in his shop front windows were accidents which he did not even see. Berenice Abbott fiercely defended Atget and his work. Goethe had said, “there is no variety of Art that should be looked upon lightly. Each has delights which great talent can bring to fulfillment.” If Atget had not had this talent he would have been just another record producer of the travel guide variety – tourist fare. I believe the photographer’s eye develops to a more intense awareness than other people’s, as a dancer develops his muscles and limbs, and a musician his ear. The photographer’s act is to see the outside world precisely, with intelligence as well as sensuous insight. This act of seeing sharpens the eye to an unprecedented acuteness. He often sees swiftly an entire scene that most people would pass unnoticed. Capturing the city of Paris and its people was the photographic art of Atget. How one becomes a photographer, well-schooled or self-taught, does not matter. Ultimately, it is the test of time. As with many of the world’s great photographer’s, their images are timeless and still have the appeal as when first developed. Not only did Atget document a city; he also captured its essence.

Lori Oden. “Eugène Atget,” on the International Photography Hall of Fame and Museum website Nd [Online] Cited 03/10/2023

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Plessis Piquet [Entrée pittoresque, Châtillon]
1921
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Porte, avenue de Paris (Versailles)
1922
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Fontaine Jarente, rue Jarente
1922
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Coin, rue Norvins et des Saules (Corner, rue Norvins et des Saules)
1925
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Parc de Sceaux
1925
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Moulin Rouge [86 boulevard de Clichy]
1926
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Rue Lanneau
1925
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Passage Moret, ruelle des Gobelins
1926
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Rue des Gobelins
1926
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Rue des Prêtres Saint-Séverin, au fond rue Boutebrie
1926
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Saint-Médard
1926
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Square Notre-Dame
1926
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Ruelle des Reculettes, Gobelins
1926
Albumen print

Eugène Atget (French, 1857-1927)
Saint-Cloud [19h matin, mars 1926]
1926
Albumen print

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Festival and exhibitions: ‘What Makes Us Human? Image in the Age of A.I.’ at the PhotoVogue Festival, BASE Milano, Milan

Exhibition dates: 16th – 19th November, 2023

Kriss Munsya (Belgium born Democratic Republic of Congo)
Dark Paradise
2022
From the series Genetic Bomb
© Kriss Munsya

It’s all in a label…

Some quotations on beauty which you may find illuminating:

“Beauty changes quickly, much as the landscape constantly changes with the position of the sun.”

Auguste Rodin

“It is certainly not true that there is in the mind of many any universal standard of beauty with respect to the human body.”

Charles Darwin, “The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection. The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex,” in Great Books of the Western World: 49, Darwin, Encyclopedia Britannica, Chicago, 1952 quoted in Elaine Hatfield and Susan Sprecher, Mirror, Mirror: The Importance of Looks in Everyday Life, State University of New York Press, Albany, 1986, p. 4.

“Beauty is not instantly and instinctively recognisable: we must be trained from childhood to make those discriminations. Nor can we assume an objective and quantifiable standard of beauty against which everyone could be judged with equal fairness …”

“Beauty becomes, like money, externalised, a possession, one that, like money, can be lost. But it is different from money, for it must be lost, sooner of later.”

Robin Lakoff and Raquel Scherr, Face Value: The Politics of Beauty, Routledge and Kegan Paul, Boston, 1984, p. 30, p. 34.

“‘Photogeneity’ is the camera’s contribution to the language of beauty. Suddenly, beauty begins to be judged in new terms… Photographic reproduction helped to make beauty big business… The success of photographically reproduced beauty depended primarily on its popular consumption. Beauty became a collective experience. And consumerism and the camera became bedfellows.

Magazines and movies felt the immediate benefits of photographic reproduction. Audiences were captivated by what they saw… Suddenly, places, objects, people, situations that had once seemed inaccessible became familiar. But at the core remained a paradox which would with time become troublesome. Photographic reproduction seemed to make things familiar, yet they remained remote. It promised intimacy, yet kept the images themselves untouchable, impersonal. In short, it offered the impossible under the guise of the possible. And so it was with beauty which, now turned professional found these media as its new arena, the place where it could best advertise itself.”

Robin Lakoff and Raquel Scherr, Face Value: The Politics of Beauty, Routledge and Kegan Paul, Boston, 1984, pp. 74-75.

“It is not so much that we have to develop a ‘new style’ of beauty … We have to transcend, in the first place, dependence on ‘style’: for as long as we worry about the current fashion in beauty, not only must we worry about ourselves as individuals and how well we fare, individual to individual; but we also become dependent upon the whims of tastemakers beyond our acquaintance, forces we cannot see or touch, and that help to create our confusion…”

Robin Lakoff and Raquel Scherr, Face Value: The Politics of Beauty, Routledge and Kegan Paul, Boston, 1984, p. 283.

“Ideal beauty is ideal because it does not exist; the action lies in the gap between desire and gratification… The beauty myth moves for men as a mirage; its power lies in its ever-receding nature. When the gap is closed, the lover embraces his own disillusion. The myth actually undermines sexual attraction. Attraction is a dialogue… that depends on the unique qualities, memories, patterns of desire, of the two people involved; “beauty” is generic. Attraction is about a sexual fit: two people imagining how they will work together.

“Beauty” is only a visual, more real on film or in stone than in three living dimensions. The visual is the sense monopolised by the advertisers, who can manipulate it much better than mere human beings. But with other senses, advertising is at a disadvantage: Humans can smell, taste, touch, and sound far better than in an advertisement. So humans, in order to become dependable, sexually insecure consumers, had to be trained away from these other, more sensual senses. One needs distance, even in the bedroom, to get a really good look … “Beauty” leaves out smell, physical response, sounds, rhythm, chemistry, texture, fit, in favour of a portrait on the pillow.

The shape and weight and texture and feel of bodies is crucial to pleasure but the appealing body will not be identical… The world of attraction grows blander and colder as everyone, first women and soon men, begin to look alike. People loose one another as more masks are assumed.”

Wolf, Naomi. The Beauty Myth. London: Vintage, 1991, pp. 176-177.

Dr Marcus Bunyan

Many thankx to PhotoVogue Festival for allowing me to publish the photographs in the posting. Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.

The PhotoVogue Festival, the first conscious fashion photography festival that focuses on the common ground between ethics and aesthetics, returns for its eighth edition. From November 16 to 19, 2023, BASE Milano will host a series of exhibitions and a three-day symposium examining the profound impact of artificial intelligence (A.I.) on human existence and the creation of images, complemented by satellite events at the city’s finest galleries. Embracing the digital era, the festival also offers online portfolio reviews and panel discussions on the PhotoVogue platform and it will give the opportunity to students from CondéFuture – a program led by Condé Nast community talent that targets high school students from underrepresented communities – to showcase some of their photography and video pieces. Last year’s edition was a great success: about 10 thousand people visited the exhibitions and attended the talks.

At the core of the new edition will be a three-day symposium, featuring a distinguished lineup of experts and thought leaders at the forefront of the A.I. revolution. This symposium aims to comprehensively address all aspects of AI around the creation of images, delving into the legal implications, copyright issues, biases, and the potential threat to the documentary value of photography. Moreover, discussions will extend to exploring how governments should act, gaining insights from big tech’s perspectives, and examining practices in place to mitigate potential threats.

Beyond the technicalities, the symposium will also embark on profound philosophical inquiries about what makes us human. It will explore the marvels of creativity that arise when art is liberated from the constraints of the real. This intellectually enriching journey promises to unveil the complexities and possibilities that AI presents to the world of visual representation, prompting us to reflect on the future of human creativity and expression.

PhotoVogue Festival is a project directed by Alessia Glaviano (Head of Global PhotoVogue) and co-curated by Francesca Marani (Senior Photo Editor, Vogue Italia) Chiara Bardelli Nonino (Editor, Writer and Curator), Daniel Rodríguez Gordillo (Content Operations & Strategy Manager, Condé Nast) and Caterina De Biasio (Visual Editor, PhotoVogue)

Since its inception, the PhotoVogue Festival has been dedicated to exploring ethically and aesthetically crucial themes, ranging from the female gaze to inclusivity and masculinity. Building on last year’s exploration of how the ubiquity of images influences our understanding of experiences and reactions to events, the upcoming PhotoVogue Festival in Milan will take a deep dive into the profound impact of artificial intelligence (A.I.) on human existence and the creation of images.

“Our intention is to address the ethical, aesthetic, and political implications raised by this revolutionary technology. Together, we will explore A.I.’s potential for reshaping our understanding of creativity, human existence, and the very essence of how we communicate and convey our visions to the world” ~ Alessia Glaviano, Head of Global PhotoVogue and Director of PhotoVogue Festival

Exhibitions

What Is Beauty

Throughout its past Open Calls, PhotoVogue festival has celebrated the female gaze, searched for the next great fashion image makers, highlighted diversity behind and in front of the camera, explored masculinity, reframed history, and consistently challenged stereotypes, clichés, and homogeneous representations. Continuing its journey dedicated to shaping a more just and inclusive society through visual literacy, PhotoVogue invited artists from around the world to submit work that challenges the traditional notions of beauty.

As cultural shifts unfold across the globe, so must the very idea of beauty evolve. We break free from the constraints of gender, perfection, and homogeneity, recognising that beauty cannot be confined to pass-fail tests based on antiquated norms. Instead, it becomes a boundless and ever-evolving concept, liberated from the tired stereotypes that once dominated our cultural landscape. Never before has artistic expression been more diversified, and representation more far-reaching.

The exhibition on display at BASE features work by 40 artists from 24 countries, selected by a jury comprising Condé Nast staff from across the globe and experts from the international visual community.

Togo Yeye is a conceptual publication by two friends – London-based photographer and Nataal art director Delali Ayivi and Lomé-based fashion activist Malaika Nabillah. Created for Ayivi’s graduate project at London College of Fashion, she and Nabillah set out to champion Togo’s young fashion creatives, contribute to debates around defining an authentic contemporary identity for the country and dream of its fantastic future.

Eb proudly shows her post-mastectomy flat closure. She chooses not to wear a prosthesis in everyday life because she feels no less of a woman without breasts. She is proud to model this for her 16-year-old daughter. Eb was told that she and her husband would not be able to conceive without IVF, but much to their surprise, she became pregnant in 2021 with her son, Arlo.

Joselin Brenda Mamani tinta (27) and Lucia Rosmeri tinta Quispe (46) from the series Imilla.

Brenda and her mother are considered Pollera women from a different ethny called Aymara from La Paz. Brenda started skateboarding 6 years ago and felt that this activity could give her direction, something to learn that would stimulate her to drop her fears and get out of her comfort zone. She says – “It makes me feel capable because I can break my own limits and I can dare to do things that I have never thought about, and like this I can get over my daily fear.

For her skateboarding in Pollera outfits means a challenge by itself because it is very hard to skateboard wearing a voluminous skirt but she knows that perseverance and practice will help and she has been improving her skills. For her this activity represents her roots, the place she comes from and who she is.

Josly, Abril and Elie portray today’s Miss Venezuela beauty pageants on a road in the city of Caracas.

The Ghanaian artist explores beauty, fashion and daily life in the African country. He focuses on the dynamic youth and their role in shaping the continent’s future. Through his energetic portraits, Annor challenges conventional beauty standards and emphasises the connections that unite the nation beyond ethnicity and religion. His art captures the essence of Africa’s cultural awakening and showcases the beauty that arises from Ghana’s unique cultural heritage.

‘I encountered this woman, who had the most mesmerising eyes I’d ever seen and a massive, tousled white wig. I asked if I could take her photograph. She hesitated, but eventually, in a barely audible voice, granted permission. I snapped a few shots, noticing a man parked nearby in a car, exuding irritation. After a couple of minutes, he walked up to the camera and declared: “Enough.” Instantly, she averted her gaze. She entered the man’s car and they swiftly departed. I doubt she comprehends the extent of her own beauty’

Leslie Fratkin

What Is Beauty / A.I.

Featuring 13 artists whose A.I.-generated image submissions earned widespread acclaim from the jury, this exhibition delves into the festival’s overarching theme, “What Makes Us Human? Image in the Age of A.I.” While distinct from traditional photography, these artworks highlight the profound intersection of technology and human creativity, inviting profound contemplation of the boundless possibilities of A.I. in reshaping the artistic landscape and its impact on human expression in the digital era.

Rozemarlin Borkent (Dutch, b. 1987)
“Ada and Amara” from the project ‘I am that I am’
Nd
(Image generated by AI)
© Rozemarlin Borkent

Xinxu Chen (Chinese, b. 1992)
“Heterochromia” from the project ‘What is beauty?’
Nd
(Image generated by AI)
© Xinxu Chen

Uncanny Atlas: Image In The Age Of A.I.

Curated by Chiara Bardelli Nonino

Photography has long been the lingua franca of our transitional epoch: an era where daily life is exponentially shifting into a virtual dimension, where relationships are consumed online, being beautiful means being photogenic, the proliferation of fake news render any collective discourse precarious and what we once called nature is reduced, at best, to content. The radical ambiguity of the photographic medium, which on the one hand promises adherence to the subject and on the other allows artifice and manipulation, seemed the perfect language to narrate a fluid world in which we moved like tightrope walkers, balancing between the digital and the real.

This exhibition aims to be a principle of cartography of this new world. And it does so through an investigation of how A.I. is changing, along with image production, our idea of photography, and inevitably also that of reality. Above all, the exhibition is an invitation to confrontation, at the intersection of many possible readings of a still largely empty map, where around the small known world there are still large, obscure areas, yet to be explored.

Michael Christopher Brown (American, b. 1978)
“#266 Stranded” from the project ’90 Miles’
Nd
(Image generated by AI)
© Michael Christopher Brown

BASE Milano
Via Bergognone, 34, 20144
Milano MI, Italy

Opening hours:
November 16: 3 – 9pm
November 17-19: 11am – 9pm

PhotoVogue Festival website

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Text: “Re-Pressentation” chapter from Marcus Bunyan’s PhD research ‘Pressing the Flesh: Sex, Body Image and the Gay Male’, RMIT University, Melbourne, 2001

November 2023

Marcus Bunyan (Australian born England, b. 1958)
“My Body (But I Do Not Own It) – Not the Governments Nor the Churches.” Self portrait as gay skinhead
1992
Silver gelatin photograph

The title of this photograph is taken from graffiti seen in Newtown, Sydney, Australia, where my scarification was done. In the image you can see that I have just had tribal scarification (cutting causing scarring) to my arm the previous night. I suggest body modifications such as tattooing, branding or scarring confronts the keeper of the body with a journey of exploration into the Self, a continuing ‘rite of passage’ through life. It is my body but I am just the keeper of it for a short period of time and I experience my body through touch, intimacy and an understanding of its interactions with my-Self and others. The title also reveals an ironic challenge to the dominant notions of traditional heterosexual skinhead identity: gay men have appropriated the skinhead image subverting it’s social identity construction because of their sexuality whilst still desiring the fantasy because of its masculinity. While this fantasy may reinforce the lust for the power of patriarchy through the use of a hyper-masculine image, the image of two gay skins walking down the street arm in arm challenges and subverts the ‘normal’ ideology and social identity of the skinhead image as racist, fascist and heterosexual.

Since the demise of my old website, my PhD research Pressing the Flesh: Sex, Body Image and the Gay Male (RMIT University, Melbourne, 2001) has no longer been available online.

I have now republished the fourth of twelve chapters, “Re-Pressentation”, so that it is available to read. More chapters will be added as I get time. I hope the text is of some interest. Other chapters include Historical Pressings (examines the history of photographic images of the male body) and Bench Press (investigates the development of gym culture, its ‘masculinity’, ‘lifestyle’, and the images used to represent it); and In Press (investigates the photographic representation of the muscular male body in the (sometimes gay) media and gay male pornography. In the title of the chapter I use the word ‘press’ to infer a link to the media.

Dr Marcus Bunyan November 2023

“Re-Pressentation” chapter from Marcus Bunyan’s PhD research ‘Pressing the Flesh: Sex, Body Image and the Gay Male’, RMIT University, Melbourne, 2001

Through plain language English (not academic speak) the text of this chapter investigates alternative ways of imag(in)ing the male body and the issues surrounding the re-pressentation of different body images for gay men. The title is a play on the word representation, an alternative way of re-pressing and re-pressenting the body in different non-stereotypical forms.

Keywords

male body, representation of the male body, male body image, gay men, alternative male body image, body image and self-esteem, masculinity, body images facades and fantasies, imaging the gay male body, gay male body

Sections

1/ The power of masculinity
2/ Body image and self-esteem
3/ High and low self-esteem
4/ Sex and self-esteem
5/ Love and respect
6/ Increasing self-esteem and happiness
7/ Body images, facades and fantasies
8/ Getting older
9/ Imaging the gay male body
10/ Re-Pressing, responsibility and respect
11/ Re-imag(in)ing the male body
12/ Conclusion

Word count: 12,048

The power of masculinity

“Awareness of the Cult of Masculinity‘s power and pull helps to loosen its grip on us. Awareness allows us to look at masculinity as something in large part that is constructed within our culture … But we must stop allowing masculinity to define who we are: We must reject the use of terms like “straight-acting” in describing ourselves and others, prevailing those among us whom we deem as more “masculine,” and thus more “straight.” We must understand that what was considered our preferred “sexual type” was in all likelihood actually formed soon after we entered the gay ghettos and saw what the Cult of Masculinity deemed as “hot.” We can each remember a time when we liked older men or thinner men or heavier men or men whose bodies didn’t fit so rigidly to the standard, men whose bodies weren’t the first or only thing we noticed.”

Michelangelo Signorile.1

To be made aware of the power of masculinity allows us the possibility of challenging that power. If we have the will and determination to do so! As we have seen in the In Press chapter it is still all too easy for the dominant hegemonic group within a subculture or society to impose and identify what a ‘valuable’ body should look like. This is achieved mainly through physical and pictorial appearance. As Michelangelo Signorile says in the above quotation, what gay men find desirable today is probably a behaviour that was formed soon after they entered the gay ghetto and saw what was termed a “hot” body. My research suggests that body-type desirability in gay men may be learned from an exposure to the images and bodies of men at a relatively early age.

These images may be found in at the beach, playing sports, reading magazines and looking at TV and pornography to name but a few. In some cases I found that the desirability for a particular type of body was altered after the gay man came out and was exposed to the imagery and body idealism present within the gay community, causing a narrowing in the range of body-types that person found desirable. This narrowing of desirability may cause anxiety and insecurity amongst gay men as they seek a partner who ‘fits’ their ideal body-type and try to match this ‘ideal’ themselves. They may feel inferior about their own body, causing a dis-ease within themselves and in their relations with others. Body image may then affect levels of self-esteem.

I suggest that the ‘Cult of Masculinity’ doesn’t necessarily attract young gay men after they first come out. Personally I believe that it is only after a period of experimentation (perhaps with androgyny, ‘campness’ or being a twink for for example, that may last some years) that gay men then start looking more closely at the development of their bodies. After the first flush of being ‘out’ and going to the clubs is over they start to want to attract a different type of man, a more masculine man, and feel they have to have the body to do so. I think gay men can then become complicit in their addiction to and desire of, the ‘ideal’ gay male hyper-masculine body. This addiction is not so much learnt in childhood but observed and stored in adolescence and the early days of being on the scene until it later finds full expression as gay men grow up.

With the emergence of the gay man onto the ‘scene’ he is exposed to the intense rituals of male body worship which are focused on one particular type of body. The images and rituals of body beautification are presented to gay men who, as free agents, are responsible for their developing addiction. As I noted in the In Press chapter, we cannot blame our addictions solely on the media or consumerism for, in reality, these images are an expression of our identity and our desires. In an interview with counsellor Barry Taylor2 I asked how he thought gay identity was formed:

BT: Perceptions are important – your perception of what you think it is to be gay is based on stereotypes – drag, dirty men in park, Commercial Road, Mardi Gras, TV, paedophilia, etc., … There is a wide range of stereotypes to draw from/engage with.

MAB: Before you ‘come out’ you don’t have ‘the look’. Gay people take on board the images of the gay community very quickly after ‘coming out’. Are there social pressures to conform to this style?

BT: Your desire to belong to the group is strong. What you have given up to come and belong to the group (eg. family, security, love) is great.
Is there something about natural beauty that leads people to it. What is it that appeals to us? The nature of the appeal of beauty.

MAB: Does it just have to be the facade though. I am interested in the inner self. How do people relate to this image. How do you get across to gay people a positive, alternative self image that says self is enough?

BT: That’s a maturity thing. When you are young and come out onto the scene you take on the image of the gay body. It happens in a short space of time. And so about 22, I start asking more questions – What’s my inner self. I see an uptake of people that come to counselling between 22-26 because there must be more to life than parties. Vulnerability – lots of depression at this time. In the gay community we can put off this 22-26 period indefinitely and continue partying (exterior image) which leads to alcohol and substance abuse and no inner development under the facade.

Gay men are attracted to identity images and styles that are seen as perpetually powerful, successful identity images within the gay community. One such style is known as the ‘Party Boy’, which is based on social affluence, looks and body image appearance, a style which is, as Damien Ridge notes below, highly restrictive. Not all gay men have the physical attributes, money, time and social contacts to attain this style, and the relentless pursuit of it can leave undeveloped the inner Self because of substance abuse, partying and the need to focus constant attention on the facade. I examine the issue of building identity & self-esteem based on appearance & body image on the following page.

“Styles such as the ‘Party Boy’, promoted on the scene and in the gay media, are highly restrictive. As with women exposed to ‘supermodels’ promoted by the fashion industry, few men have the social resources, appearances and body type to fully emulate the ‘Party Boy’. In an environment that prioritises style, this inadequacy readily taps into informants’ insecurities. The inability to fit in with dominant gay middle-class styles works to isolate and alienate young men regardless of class or ethnicity. Informants report they need to constantly work on their styles, such as their weight and physiques, to gain and maintain access to valued social networks, sex, and relationships.”3

Marcus Bunyan (Australian born England, b. 1958)
I Do Dick, Glenn, Darlinghurst, Sydney
1992
Silver gelatin photograph

The title is taken from the graffiti seen at the right of Glenn

Body image and self-esteem

“Appearance is not a very stable or permanent basis for self-esteem. Not everyone agrees about who is attractive, so even the best-looking are bound to receive mixed reviews. Furthermore, no matter how attractive people are, there will always be times when they do not feel attractive – when suffering from a cold or when they get old. We can always find flaws in ourselves. Objective observers may tell us we are cute and adorable, but we are likely to mutter, “Sure, except for my nose.” Finally, no matter how good-looking a person is, there will always be others who seem better looking. Many of the best looking people compare themselves with someone better-looking, someone younger, and conclude they are not good enough.”

Elaine Hatfield and Susan Sprecher4

May I suggest that self-esteem is an evaluation, either positively or negatively, of self worth. It is based on global (or overall) self-esteem and local self- esteem (such as body image) – conditions that positively or negatively affect each other. Self-esteem is formed by reflected appraisal (what you think other people think of you) and social comparison (comparing yourself with others) and is improved by achieving things within different spheres of your life. Positive self-esteem can lead to a condition of happiness with all aspects of the self. It is the ability to value and love yourself not in an ego way (look at me I’m beautiful, I’m gorgeous) but in a way that accepts all faults and grievances and values them as part of an overall identity.

Lou Benson thinks that self-esteem, “Is a quiet confidence in one’s own worth regardless of any shortcomings or deficiencies. Fromm describes it as the ability to love oneself, not by falsifying a version of the self, but by acceptance of what one really is.”5

Erich Fromm says that self-esteem is essential if we are to love ourselves as well as others. He continues, “The affirmation of one’s own life, happiness, growth, freedom, is rooted in one’s capacity to love, ie., in care, respect, responsibility, and knowledge. If an individual is able to love productively he loves himself too; if he can only love others he cannot love at all.”6

Here Fromm is arguing for a love of the self that is not narcissistic, but based on a true ‘care’ for the self. I think that many gay men suffer from an inability to truly love themselves in this sense. They seek completion of their self in an image of themselves (narcissism) and in the image of others (voyeurism). This is where body image impacts on levels of self-esteem. Researchers such as Leonard Wankel7 have found that body image is related to self-esteem. Crockett and Peterson8 have also found that in adolescence physical attractiveness is one of the key domains that affect a person’s judgement of their self-esteem. My research also suggests that how a gay man feels about his own and his partner’s body image can be a factor in the decision to have sex without a condom. Gay men place greater emphasis on physical attractiveness than heterosexual men and it continues to be a priority throughout their lives.

Appearance is vital in the association between self-esteem and body image (because it is present in every visible social interaction, including sexual relations, that takes place between human beings), but as Elaine Hatfield and Susan Sprecher have noted in the quotation above, appearance is not a very permanent or stable basis for self-esteem. Still, it would seem that many gay men seek higher self-esteem by altering their appearance, believing it (higher SE) can be attained by changing their bodies. This is like building a house on sand – eventually the house is washed away as the foundations are built on unstable ground; we all get older and loose our looks and there is always someone that is better looking than ourselves.

Through behaviours formed in the crucible of the gay beauty ritual some gay men come to believe that the only way to raise their self-esteem is to pump their bodies at the gym in order to be able to compete against other gay men. But having a good body image does not necessarily mean that you will also have good self-esteem.

Marcus Bunyan (Australian, b. 1958)
Glenn, Darlinghurst, Sydney
1992
Silver gelatin photograph

High and low self-esteem

According to Hatfield and Sprecher, “People with low self-esteem are often afraid they will be rejected. They fear stepping out of line and being different. They seek social approval. Shy teenagers, unsure of themselves, find it very difficult to date a person who friends find unappealing. High self-esteem individuals, on the other hand, are not so desperate for social approval. They can afford to date someone much less attractive than they are.”9

Fundamentally I believe that these observations are flawed.

I agree that people with low self esteem are often afraid of rejection. But do they seek social approval? Perhaps not. For example, if an unattractive person was given the chance of having sex with his body image ideal only by having sex without a condom he would not be seeking social approval for his actions. His actions would be contrary to societies moral and ethical taboo against unsafe sex. On the other hand high self-esteem individuals are equally if not more desperate for social approval so that they can keep their self-esteem high. They usually date someone who is as beautiful and as built, tanned, and toned as they are! Its like looking in a mirror – they see a reflection of their own perfection in their partner and they have to show this possession off to other people to reinforce their high self-esteem; if they fear loosing him they could have sex without a condom to try to keep him.

From the evidence of my research data I suggest that people with different levels of self-esteem are equally likely to have sex without a condom.

People with low self-esteem might have unsafe sex because they think that they won’t get the man they desire otherwise. People with high self-esteem could have unsafe sex because they feel invincible and that their stunning partner couldn’t possibly be infected with the HIV / AIDS virus. People with a built body image but low self-esteem might seek validation of themselves and their body through the adoration of another and then fuck this other person unsafely. There are so many different contexts and no hard and fast rules.

Having a great body does not necessarily mean we feel good about ourselves as appearance is not everything; overall self-esteem is based on a whole heap of other factors, as well as body image, that affect our lives. Conversely, if we feel good about our overall self this can help us feel good about our body and I think that an acceptance of Self does not come through appearance alone, but is possible only through the integration of all parts of the Self into a balanced holistic whole. Of course, self-esteem, body image and sex without a condom are very complex issues and I realise that body image is not the only criteria in assessing the likelihood of unsafe sexual practices taking place.

Sex and self-esteem

“The myth of the ‘Cult of Masculinity’ … is that validation and self- worth are achieved through physical adoration. The cult encourages single gay men to believe they can achieve self-worth through sex, and it encourages men in relationships to believe that they can boost self-esteem by having sex outside the relationship.”

Michelangelo Signorile10

Much like money, photographs of muscular male bodies have ‘value’ without the owner of the body ever being present. This is because society knows the semiotic language in which they (the bodies and the photographs) speak and what their social value and power is. The same thing could be said for muscular bodies in real life; even though you can see and desire the bodies in question and you know their social value and the power of their image you can’t touch unless given permission. And usually permission is given only to those that match up to the same ‘ideals’ so that sex then becomes a validation of Self, of the person’s own existence. As Michelangelo Signorile has said (in the quotation above), this encourages gay men to believe they can increase their self worth through sex (trophy collecting), especially by having sex with someone who comes close to the ‘ideal’ either inside or outside of a relationship.

Having sex with someone is exciting and fun but it is not an understanding of the whole person. Personally I have used sex with gay men as a form of handshake, getting to know what they were like, an introduction as to whether we were compatible sexually yes, but also whether we got along on a social and intellectual level. That I could get along with him, that I wanted him around, that we liked doing things together and that we wanted to help each other along the way. Sex for me has always been used as a tool in this manner – to make friendships and relationships with other gay men. To have great sex, to have some fun but also to find out what makes them tick.

I believe that there are many gay men that use sex to increase their self worth but I also suggest that quite a few gay men use sex in the way I do, as a way of getting to know other men.11 They are looking for something or someone. Not just an addiction to pleasure, an increasing of self worth through sex but a search for a deeper connection. But paradoxically gay men seem scared of this connection, fearful of the exposure and revealing of Self to others that this intimacy brings. For gay men who are supposed to be more sensitive to the feminine side of their masculinity, I find that many gay men are afraid of touching, holding and intimacy.

(The hero in our society is usually ‘masculine’, with a well defined and muscular body such as Tarzan or Superman, the Man of Steel. Heterosexual iconography portrays him as powerful, masterly, and virile. Gay men have adopted this stereotype in opposition to the effeminate ‘camp’ pansy stereotype still present today. I suggest that gay men adopt this ‘masculine’ stereotype in order to be seen as ‘real’ men. In adopting this symbolic facade, the mask like iconography may create a paradox between the desire for, and fear of, intimacy and closeness. This fear may form a taboo against intimacy and closeness and the troubling revelations that these conditions can bring.)

Marcus Bunyan (Australian born England, b. 1958)
Fred and Andrew Smoking a Joint in Paris
1992
Silver gelatin photograph

Love and respect

“One of the most essential factors in the respect for others concerns their uniqueness and individuality. Love in this sense becomes the recognition and affirmation of the uniqueness of the other. It is not the loss of the self or the subservience of one’s self to another, but the recognition of the many individual qualities that make up the particular individual and the acceptance of their existence. The lover even respects those qualities of the other with which he is not always in accord.”

Lou Benson13

According to Lou Benson love is a respect for the uniqueness and individuality of your partner even if you don’t agree with him on some issues. I believe he is right. It is not the loss of the Self in an-other nor the completion of the Self in an-other (your partner is one’s ‘other half’ as though you are completing your- self in another), it is love through an understanding of the true representation of Self and other and the development of a happiness within and through that journey. But one doesn’t have to be in love to put this understanding into practice. In everyday life the relationships and interactions that we form can be informed by our respect for others, whatever they look like, whoever they are. We are ‘aware‘ of our situation, of our own and other’s ego projections, and this awareness can help us in the acceptance of ourselves and others. Through exploration and respect for the Self we can make our lives happier.

Increasing self-esteem and happiness

Good self-esteem involves the acceptance of all facets of our identity. It is the integration of all strands of our personality into a unified whole. If we visualise, are aware of what we do at any given time; if we are aware of the process of, say, the creativity of cooking a meal, we enjoy the experience as much as the outcome. It is not just the final product but the journey itself that gives us satisfaction. This process is called ‘self-actualization’,14 and I think it can help us to attain higher self-esteem. We fulfil our potential both in the journey and in the outcome and this can make us happier. Instead of pinning after something we cannot have, we accept what we have to work with and get on with it! We enjoy the experience instead of whingeing about it all the time.

“Another important area in which self-actualizing people differ from others is in their non-judgemental acceptance of themselves. Maslow says that they seem to have a lack of overriding guilt and crippling shame and also to be free of the anxieties that usually accompany these feelings. They can accept their own human nature in the stoic style, with all its shortcomings, with all its discrepancies from the ideal image without feeling real concern (Maslow 1970). Such feeling of comfort and acceptance with the self are extremely important in terms of laying down a tone that underlies a person’s whole existence.” (My bold).

~ Lou Benson15

I feel that the above quotation is very important for gay men who have been persecuted, may feel guilt and shame at being homosexual, hate their bodies, and who may have given up the security and love of family and friends to ‘come out’ as a gay man. They hopefully learn to accept their own human nature with all its discrepancies from the ‘ideal’ image. This acceptance of Self helps to improve overall self-esteem and provides the basis for a state of happiness within the Self. Interest in change should be encouraged. Instead of sitting in the middle of a comfort zone we can put some faith in ourselves and our ability to challenge cultural and personal stereotypes.

Marcus Bunyan (Australian born England, b. 1958)
Jeff standing on his Chrysler, Studley Park, Melbourne, Victoria, 1992
1992
Silver gelatin photograph

Body images, facades and fantasies

“There are these guys, hot guys with, I mean, the really chiselled bodies, who I used to look at in awe, who wouldn’t give me the time of day,” recalls David … “I didn’t exist to them. I wasn’t a person. I’d try to strike up a conversation at the bar, and they’d just turn away, in a mean way – treated me like shit. Now, here it is four years later, and I’m all built up, got my forty-two-inch chest and my big biceps, and now these guys are all over me – they can’t get enough of me. And, well, I have to say it does make me feel powerful. I’ve conquered them. That is a feeling of power.”

Michelangelo Signorile16

Has David really conquered them or has he been defeated by the very ‘disciplinary system’ (the power of the muscular body) that was excluding him in the first place? If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em so to speak. That feeling of power that he now feels he has; does he now ignore other people who used to look like he did; does he treat them the same way he was treated; does he treat them like shit as well?

I don’t think that David has conquered them at all.

I suggest he has just capitulated and joined the dominant body image ideology within gay society. Is this power giving him a false sense of self-esteem? Possibly. For in the end he is relying on his body, one part of himself which with wither and age anyway, to uphold his self-esteem. Without the body he was always wanting to belong. Now he has the body he belongs to what?

Perhaps he belongs to a powerful hierarchical ‘disciplinary system’ that controls the desires of other gay men through the symbolic image of the muscular mesomorphic body image. I asked Barry Taylor17 about body image, the fantasy of the ‘ideal’, self-esteem and learning to accept the self:

BT: Because of metabolism, some people will never have the body beautiful and this ALMOST BECOMES A GRIEF to them. THE CRUCIAL POINT THEN BECOMES HOW CAN I BE SATISFIED IN MY-SELF? Then it becomes who am I, and about my self-acceptance.

MAB: How do you change images of the male body to broaden their appeal?

BT: Its difficult. You are dealing with fantasy and the erotic, transcending the mundane of everyday life…

MAB: And so this body beautiful image becomes the fantasy?

BT: Yes, it is the fantasy.

MAB: How can you change that image to become different fantasies not just one?

BT: This would be a long term process of cultural change. One way would be to present images that are normative but are also sexy … Another way would be a broader cultural change in which we are encouraging a greater sense of self-awareness and depth, [NOT self-reflexivity] so that people can be more accepting of those kind of differences – that we feel good about those kind of different relationships. I can construct and feel sexy in bigness, hairy legs, being thin … The last thing would be to build resilience in our lives and this happens by experiencing success and achievement in our lives (and this builds self-esteem).

How do I measure success and achievement?

If I measure success and achievement by getting the body beautiful …

MAB: And belonging to the ‘A team’ …

BT: … then I am going to be constantly disappointed. But if I say this is Barry Taylor and I am happy with who I am, I am happy in my work or whatever, I’m not only successful, but I also have MEANING and am CONTENTED with that.

MAB: I think it is very good to challenge the self, challenge the path you are taking in life, but also for that path to have meaning and for you to be contented in what you are doing.

BT: To be comfortable in going through that process. The other thing is that people around you affirm that path, and affirm and celebrate what we do. Once you find a group of like-minded people that are affirming and nurturing of me, then growth often occurs.

MAB: For the older gay man who hasn’t developed that inner sense of self, and the body sags and its all gone, how do they cope?

BT: Vulnerable thing. The new priest, as it were, is the therapist. Not only because people have problems to deal with, but because they are on a spiritual journey.

The construction, social reproduction and representation of meaning in image identity is critical.

Indeed, Barry Taylor sees the last part of ‘coming out’ as an integration of sexuality into the identity of the whole self. This process may not take place until the gay men is well into his thirties, when they are on a spiritual journey. Unfortunately, as Barry Taylor comments later in the interview (see below), many gay men put off this journey by constantly immersing themselves in the ‘Party Boy’ image and living behind a facade.

In an age when I believe there is a shifting down of the time frame of the development of not just homosexual men but all human beings, I suggest it is important that we do not hide behind facades and have the courage to face adversity and encourage our diversity. We can help maintain high self-esteem by promoting the positive side of our identities and abilities without hiding behind masks.

We must not be afraid to fantasise about bodies that are different from the stereotype. I like scars, broken noses, bow legs and slim boys! I find these things very, very sexy but some people are amazed that I do. They think it strange, but attractiveness rather than ‘beauty’ depends upon a deeper understanding in the eye of the beholder; someone may be considered a great beauty in a ‘collective’ sense but I believe attractiveness is of a more personal, individual consideration.

For example, I don’t think that work alone would make many gay men fancy a ‘weary’, world worn face and many would find such a face unattractive. But many gay men still have fantasies about ‘straight-acting’ men such as plumbers and labourers! To be told through social stereotyping that something is beautiful is not the same as making up our own mind that we find a person attractive.

Lakoff and Scherr have pointed out,

“We must learn to separate our judgements about beauty from our learned expectations, that is, our social stereotypes. We must close the gap between what we really find beautiful, and what we think we find beautiful because we have been told to think that way … We must learn, somehow, to accept a wider range of physical attributes as potentially ‘beautiful’.”18 (My bold).

We form our self-esteem partially through the appraisal of those around us. If we can encourage gay men to appreciate a wider range of body-types as fantasies, then perhaps more gay men would not feel the need to conform to the dominant ideal of the muscular mesomorphic body and this could lead to higher levels of self-esteem in gay men who do not ‘fit’ this ideal.

Marcus Bunyan (Australian, b. 1958)
Fred and Andrew, Sherbrooke Forest
1992
Gelatin silver print

Getting older

As gay men get older (from their mid-twenties onwards) they may perhaps begin to contemplate the rituals of life in a more understanding and accepting way (although the ageism evidenced in online gay cruising sites is particularly evident). Their seems to be a general expansion of the body-types that gay men find desirable at this time. Perhaps this expansion is due to several factors:

1. Sexual attractions may change and become more diverse the older we get.

2. As we get older (into our thirties), we may become less fussy in our choice of sexual partners due to the availability of sex with prospective partners that ‘fit’ our ideal body-types.

3. We may become more aware of every-body having something to offer and that what is presented is just an image – that we must get past the image / facade to look inside.

Extracts from research project interviews

Can you tell me what was your ideal body type:

a) When you were first attracted to men 14-17: About the same body shape as himself – tall, slender, petite.

b) When you had your first sexual experiences with men. 17-20: It changed into a bit more muscular. Anthony had moved to the city by this time and he had just started going to gay clubs, around the age of 17-18. Saw his first gay porn around the age of 20. Anthony was looking at older guys with bigger, more developed bodies. Anthony wanted a body like that himself because he was very thin.

c) Now 32: Like stocky guys now, depends on what sexual experience he is after. So the body influences the sexual experience. He has a greater appreciation of different body-types now. Range of desire is broader. Still smooth: 0-10% hairy chest only.

Interview with Anthony, Australian, 32, 5’10”, 69kg. Melbourne. 23/09/1998.

Can you tell me what was your ideal body type:

a) When you were first attracted to men: A proper man or what he defined then as a proper man. Straight acting, slightly butch type. This was before coming out. About 16 saw Tv experience on Channel 4 – homosexual virtual sex , voyeurism, rubbing of naked bodies and simulated fucking. They were gym fit, stereotypical gay bodies. First idea of a gay body was this kind of body. His idea of the ideal body type was formed quite early on before coming out.

b) When you had your first sexual experiences with men: Basically the same.

c) Now 23: It has changed now. He doesn’t look at stereotypes as much now and looks at the individual person instead. He tends to notice them more if they have shaved heads. Is this just another stereotype though? Its personal taste and depends on who the individual is – what chemistry is happening. More confident about his body now after starting going to the gym. Promised himself to get a “better” body – brings other rewards – more attention, more looks from people, gives him more self-esteem. Works on different areas – is quite aware of mental, spiritual areas and feels body is just part of an overall package.

Phil feels that if he wanted sex any time he could go out and get it (the sauna or sex venue) and this would not be based so much on body image. Does not use his body to go out and get sex. He has lower self-esteem in regards to positioning his body in an order of desirability – he feels that there are more people higher up the body chain with better bodies than him. How does that make him feel? He shuts himself off to this when cruising. On the street it does not matter as he has higher self-esteem there.

Interview with Phil, English, 23, about 5’10”, 73kg, robotics technician, middle class. Melbourne. 13/09/1997.

MB: Interesting that in situations of cruising and the street that levels of body image self-esteem change – possibly because in one situation Phil reveals his body image, has less control and is more vulnerable to the judging gaze of others. In the other he is clothed and the revealing of his body can be escaped from. The element of an ‘order of desirability’ is much more pronounced in an unclothed cruising environment.

Can you tell me what was your ideal body type:

a) When you were first attracted to men 13-19: Large and ripply. Because he is small he was attracted to the security of larger men. Particularly muscles, smooth people. Pre-anything in gay mags – going down beach seeing other men.

b) When you had your first sexual experiences with men 19-20: Difficult to attract men – sheltered because he liked that muscular stereotype and could not have it. So he was on his own, so when he was approached he tried to make friends instead of solely looking at the body. That worked OK.

c) Now 23: It has changed a lot – he now likes all manner of shapes and sizes. Growing up and accepting other people for who and what they are. Now he is much happier in his self and this helps!

Interview with Marcus, Australian, 23, 5’4″, 65kg, worker – storeman/packer, waiter, middle-class. Lives country Victoria area. 28/09/1997.

Can you tell me what was your ideal body type:

a) When you were first attracted to men: Definitely muscular Adonis look – bulging everything, smooth. Formed that through a natural liking for this kind of body – influenced by seeing these images in news media and TV programmes such as OUT (gay and lesbian programme on SBS) and gay magazines. Bombarded by this image.

b) When you had your first sexual experiences with men (came out at 18): Very much the same.

c) Now 22: Hairy men are quite attractive now – explains this through experiencing them. Attraction with hairier men because they were more masculine. Still muscular – an appreciation of the image. He has become more perceptive towards peoples individuality in body-image composition. Very rarely do people fit into the media image ideal that they sell us. It is not important that they do – is it important for them?

Interview with Michael, Australian, 22, 5’10”, 83kg, clerk, working-middle class. Melbourne. 05/10/1997.

Can you tell me what was your ideal body type:

a) When you were first attracted to men 12-26: Usually the blond hair, blue eyes and slim muscular thing – good legs, good arse. Not attracted to body hair. Never attracted to really tall men – went for the balanced, proportionate look in respect to height.

b) When you had your first sexual experiences with men 26-30: Gavin’s first sexual experience was 2 men in a car in a car park in St. Kilda. The blue-eyed blond was supplemented when he started to look at gay porn videos – hairy chests, the Mediterranean look, interested in the construction worker, working men (‘straight-acting’ fantasy). The images in the porn videos and mags influenced the bodies he liked. Even started to look at family albums and noticed how handsome relatives were in their earlier years.

c) Now 34: Gavin’s idea of “gorgeous” is really wide – but whether he goes further depends upon their personality, intelligence, sensitivity, honesty, punctuality, inner soul stuff. Guys who exercise their inner spirituality in some way. He finds it difficult to relate to people who spend lots of time at the gym and on the facades. His appreciation of different body-types has increased a lot – in combination with inner work.

Interview with Gavin, Australian, 34, 6′, 70kg, middle-class. Melbourne. 03/11/1997.

For some gay men this expansion is a very positive growth experience. Other gay men do not undertake it at all, forever mired in the never ending circuit of drugs, body, lifestyle and party scene until well into their mid-thirties to early forties.

Barry Taylor had important things to say about this age group:

BT: The next big group is 35 onwards – who by now may have developed a major alcohol and drug problem.

In their 40’s, they desire the body beautiful and try to buy young boys, go to the sauna and can’t pick up. They suicide because of loneliness – because the gay community doesn’t provide any other model for them (other than the body beautiful). No place for them to meet and be part of.

MAB: I always wanted a big body. I have struggled with that for years. Now, at 39, how does the gay community support men in mid-life? In the last 6 months acceptance is starting to come that I am no longer young in body, but still young at heart!

BT: This happens because you start to synthesise yourself. This is the last stage of coming out, I believe. This is Barry Taylor who works in the area of suicide, who likes classical music, has a sense of the spiritual self and is also gay. So the area of sexuality is only one part of who I am. I am not reliant on going to gay places all the time. If I’m still in the PRIDE stage, so long as your young and fit into the image, on and on it goes. BUT – if a relationship fails, you loose your job, or have some insight of who you really are, that’s when suicide can happen. They crack or they do something about it.

MAB: Is this mid-life crisis happening younger these days?

BT: Yes, I’m seeing some suicidal people at 14-15 who have had enough of life, are wearied out. At 22-26 people are looking for more choices. The first group used to be in their 20’s but are now in their teens.

MAB: Ages have not compacted but have shifted down.

BT: Yes, people are finding a void and are looking for a spiritual self earlier.In the past it has been mainstream religion but now they are searching for something different in the void of boredom – because mainstream religion has not been a factor in their lives.

MAB: The adverts that appear in Blue, XY, Large magazines – they perpetuate the myth of the beautiful body.

BT: Yes, that’s right. Gay life is like school or adolescence. If you are invited to a group party, they have the power, they are popular, the select ‘in’ crowd.”

Jez Smith (Australian)
Antigay
Nd
in Blue Magazine. Sydney: Studio Magazines, April 1997, p. 23.

“There’s a new gay sentiment sweeping the globe and it’s perpetrators are homos themselves. They don’t object to what we are – just what we’ve become.”

Imaging the gay male body

“The gay scene is a market and both sellers and buyers have become used to the coinage of appeal and neither can change it without losing out. The way the compulsive cruisers present themselves is geared to the way the buyers choose: looking no further than skin deep, ignoring what might or what might not be underneath … The majority of gays are placing their cosmetic selves, not their real selves, on the line.”

R. Houston19

An article in April 1997 Blue Magazine titled “McQueer” examined the impact of the commercialisation of ‘gay’. In a short but interesting article David Taylor looked at a book called ‘Anti-Gay’ edited by Mark Simpson, first published in 1996. This book, through essays by social commentators from different parts of the world, examines the development of a backlash against the attitudes and ideologies of the commercial gay scene.

In the article The Divine David observes that, “Anti-gay is a reaction by the people to their dissatisfaction with a lot of the imagery used in the gay media that centres around total body obsession, and the idea that being gay is some sort of lifestyle that has to be pandered to (and is quite expensive). Being gay has become a commercial thing which doesn’t seem to have anything to do with civil rights or people feeling comfortable with their sexuality. ‘Gay’ has resulted in something which is quite soulless.”

Paul Burston also explains that, “When I say I’m anti-gay, it doesn’t mean that I hate all of the things that the gay scene is. What I’m saying is that I hate a lot of the mindset that comes attached to that – it’s the herding instinct I hate. And there is no reason why people should feel they can’t still take part in the scene, so long as they think for themselves.”

Here is the crux of the argument. To think for oneself. To be aware.

Because it is not enough to blame the media or the ‘scene’, it is important to think for oneself and be aware of the pressures, addictions and imagery that interacting with the commercial gay scene may involve. As an alternative to the commercial gay scene quite a few alternative clubs like Kooky and Home in Sydney and Queer & Alternative in Melbourne have sprung up over the last 5 years to cater for gay people disillusioned with the usual scene pubs and clubs.

‘Blue’ choose to illustrate the “McQueer” article with the image above by Jez Smith. While interesting the image is difficult to read. The body, in it’s deconstruction, becomes dehumanised and has virtually no identity at all. The image seems to be saying that by being anti-gay your body is not worthy of being a fantasy for other gay men. Compare this with other images appearing in the same and later issues of ‘Blue’ with the interchangeability and replaceability of the muscular, smooth, white Adonis that usually grace the pages of the magazine.

As informative social comment the article pays lip service to alternative points of view, to alternative discursive structures and images within society that do not have space to express themselves, but is just a token gesture on the part of the publisher whose magazine constantly reinforces underlying social values and stereotypes in regards to male body image representations.

A different approach has been taken by the Body Shop. The first issue of it’s magazine Full Voice20 looks at the body and self-esteem. Of course, the Body Shop promotes it’s own philosophy and ‘natural’ product within this magazine – it’s a commercial money making enterprise otherwise they wouldn’t be in business – but the magazine does not pull any punches. Below is an image from the magazine; it shows how a ‘natural’ looking Barbie model would appear and comments on how many women really do look like supermodels.

Anonymous photographer
Untitled
1997
Body Shop advertisement in Roddick, Anita (ed.,). Full Voice Issue One. Australia: Adidem Pty. Ltd., 1997

The magazine asks what self-esteem is? It replies:

“SELF RESPECT
SELF AUTHORITY
DIGNITY
PRIDE
AWARENESS
CALMNESS
THE PURSUIT OF DREAMS
A SENSE OF ACHIEVEMENT
A TWINKLE IN THE EYE
THE LIVING OF LIFE”

The magazine contains articles for women on such issues as ‘ideal’ body image versus ‘real’ body image, 10 social symptoms of high and low self-esteem, fat versus thin, how to create a beauty advert called “Want to Know a Secret?” (which is a real laugh), and what is beauty? It concludes with these lines:

“Somewhere in time, society lost the plot. We decided how a person looked was more important that who that person was. When that time was, no-one knows. But we can remember the time we started to put it right.”

The Body Shop should be applauded for their effort. We must acknowledge, though, that people will be attracted to other people through an appearance that engages with their sexual fantasies. This only becomes a problem when sexual attraction through physical appearance turns to discrimination against other people who don’t match their ‘ideal’ look. In an important observation, Greg Blanchford has noted of the sexual objectification of gay men occurring in casual encounters that,

“People in these situations will not be attracted to someone unless they are attracted by some external feature that fulfils some sexual fantasy. It follows that there must be an emphasis on surface or cosmetic characteristics. And because the criteria of selection can be highly specific, one is, in turn, concerned to present an image of oneself that will attract others. Therefore appearance, dress, manner and body build are very important.”21

Of course these elements are important but unfortunately, in our society, not everyone can have a fabulous body build, appearance or dress and the way we treat attractive as opposed to unattractive people is not always equal and fair. Our reaction to the individual shapes the way that their self-esteem may develop and may affect their relationship with the world. If you keep telling an unattractive person that they are unattractive they will eventually begin to believe this themselves. This is called a ‘self-fulfilling prophecy‘. The individual becomes a victim of our discrimination and eventually perpetuates this damaging discrimination upon themselves.

XY Magazine, a publication aimed principally at gay youth, ran a Body Issue in April 1997. Under the title “Perfect Bound,” William Mann talked to social commentators Michelangelo Signorile, Michael Bronski and Victor D’Lugin amongst others. In a thought provoking article Mann asks,

“How many gay kids are … struggling through identity issues like being skinny, or socially awkward or whatever? What does the image of the pumped-up pretty white boy – plastered all over our magazines, our advertising, our literature, and our erotica – say to the non-white or skinny gay kid, looking to find a place in a community that seems to have no place for people who look like him?”22

Anonymous photographers
Untitled
Nd
Pages from back issues featured in XY Magazine No. 7. California: XY Publishing. April/May 1997

What indeed – what does it say to them? Does the image make them feel inadequate? Does it alienate them not just from themselves but also from the gay community, a community to which they aspire to belong?

Here, I am not saying you can’t find muscular bodies desirable as long as you understand the possible consequences for other gay men who do not possess such a body. As Michael Bronski notes in the same article, “The minute someone points out something where we should be more culturally sensitive, there’s this cry of political correctness. People see it as an attack on them, a loss for them. But nobody’s saying you can’t find Marky Mark and his kind attractive.”

Indeed nobody is, including myself. I am the first to admire a good, muscular body and always wanted one myself. But I am aware of the problems and alienation from self that such a desire can cause. Under the heading NO PECS, NO SEX Mann goes on to say that this kind of body is not always available for sex and the more that we find this kind of body attractive the less sex we will have. “And when we do [have sex], its always the same, and we miss many kinds of pleasure.” Mann asks Michael Bronski about this point and, talking about the body of the buffed, white, muscular male he replies, “The image is so clean and ultimately non-threatening that it doesn’t allow for us to explore our sexuality, to see what the limits of our fantasies might be.”

Michelangelo Signorile observes that,

“Looking out at the hordes of shirtless, pumped-up men, each virtually indistinguishable from the next, it dawned on me just how much pressure is put on young gay men as they enter the gay community – more than ever before. It’s true that there have always been paradigms in the gay world, but it seemed in the past there were more choices, more leeway about what was considered a gay stud. Today only one very precise body type is acceptable – one that very few gay men have or can achieve. …

We need to empower people who don’t feel attractive. I’m not saying that for vast numbers of people the club and party scene is not fun, is not great. But those who don’t fit in need to see other images. Lots of people don’t see themselves in what they see of gay culture. The range of what’s attractive needs to be expanded, not because it’s a good thing we should do, but because the range really is broader.””23

Anonymous photographer
Marky Mark
Nd
in XY Magazine No.7. April/May 1997, p. 27

“Marky Mark on 60 foot high Calvin Klein advertising board: icon of beauty, or body fascism?”

Finally, the conclusions reached by the article are that:

1. We should try and empower people who don’t feel attractive.
2. We should offer different images to people who feel they don’t fit in.
3. We should broaden the range of what can be seen as attractive.
4. We have limited our own sexual freedom by this hierarchy of beauty.

Then we look at the images that run in the same issue of XY Magazine, a magazine which is marketed and primarily sells to young gay men.

Advertisements for back issues include images that illustrate articles such as ‘Confessions of a Jock-Lover’, or ‘Palm Springs DOA: I Survived the White Party’, (see above images) which feature stunning, rippled torsos. The White Party is a Circuit party in America held to raise money for HIV / AIDS research where there are lots of gorgeous built men all running around having sex and taking drugs – the contrast between the built body and the AIDS body full of sad irony. Then there is the fashion shoot titled ‘Straight acting’. Yes, the models are from different ethnic backgrounds (no racial discrimination here!), but they are all smooth and built (see image below).

These photographs and many more like them feature in the monthly issues of XY magazine, a mag aimed at gay youth. I believe it is constructive that such issues are being debated but, as with the ‘Blue’ article, it is just a token offering that does very little to change omnipresent omnipotent social ideals.

Bradford Noble
Untitled
Nd
Images from ‘Straight Acting’ Clothes feature, XY Magazine No. 7. California: XY Publishing. April/May 1997, pp. 45-49.

Spiros Politis
Untitled
Nd
in Todd, Matthew. “In the Eye of the Beholder,” in Mattera, Adam (ed.,). Attitude Vol. 1 No. 66. London: Northern and Shell PLC, October 1999, pp. 56-57.

Left to right: Phil 49, engineer; Andy 21, student; Jon 21, student; Josh 25, escort; Jody 21, aerobics instructor.

Another article that attempts to address issues of beauty, body image and self-esteem in gay men appeared in the October 1999 issue of the London based Attitude magazine. Titled “In the Eye of the Beholder,” journalist Matthew Todd asks rather inane questions about the representation of bodies and the ‘scene’ of four ‘ordinary’ and one ‘perfect’ gay men (see image above). It is interesting to observe that these ‘ordinary’ gay men, while noting that gay magazines “ram it down your throat that ‘You should look like this!'” (Andy) offer no possible alternatives that they think would work to break the dominance of the visual stereotype of the muscular mesomorphic body image.

Although articles such as this do raise awareness of some of the issues concerned with self-esteem and body image, they also confirm the authority of visual ‘fantasy’ images that allows magazines (such as Attitude) to justify the continued publication of white, smooth, muscular ‘Party Boys’ as the epitome of what a gay man should look like by confirming that this image is what the consumer wants to see. This observation is confirmed by presenting a selection of the male body images that appear in articles, not advertisements, in the same issue of Attitude magazine.

Escapism and fantasy (linked to anti-authority and the feminine) are thus grounded in the authority and fixity of the sign of the muscular mesomorphic body image through desire for and “attraction to good looks,” through the watching of the objective eye, and through a nostalgia for the paradise of the perfect body. The authority and meaning of this sign is upheld “through the interpretative acts of members of a sign community,” particularly when the meaning and power of the sign is reinforced and dominant within the gay community. This can be contrasted with a partially seeing objective eye which offers an appreciation of ‘truth’ (subjective, objective, fluid and non-final) through imperfection, diversity, and an acknowledgement of difference. I correlate this non-finality with the quotation by Wendy Chapkis that I use as a summation at the end of the Re-Pressentation chapter.

Axel Hoedt
Eric Travis
Nd
in Todd, Matthew. “”Naked,” in Mattera, Adam (ed.,). Attitude Vol. 1 No. 66. London: Northern and Shell PLC, October 1999, p. 38.

Axel Hoedt
Will Mellor
Nd
in Todd, Matthew. “”Naked,” in Mattera, Adam (ed.,). Attitude Vol. 1 No. 66. London: Northern and Shell PLC, October 1999, p. 48.

David Zanes
Ryan Elliot
Nd
in Todd, Matthew. “”Naked,” in Mattera, Adam (ed.,). Attitude Vol. 1 No. 66. London: Northern and Shell PLC, October 1999, p. 50.

Neil MacKenzie
Luke Goss
Nd
in Todd, Matthew. “”Naked,” in Mattera, Adam (ed.,). Attitude Vol. 1 No. 66. London: Northern and Shell PLC, October 1999, p. 54.

Stephan Ziehan
Sam Fragiacomo
Nd
in Clark, Adrian and Day, Luke. “Essentials: Grooming,” in Mattera, Adam (ed.,). Attitude Vol. 1 No. 66. London: Northern and Shell PLC, October 1999, p. 104.

I love how all the penises are covered up with towels or cushions and I note that traditional symbols of masculinity are also well represented – the cigar and the boxing gloves for example. Eric Tavis also happens to be a wrestler as well as a model. Also, notice how all bodies are smooth, white, muscular and look like they could have been pressed from the same mould.

For gay men in contemporary society the maintenance of a healthy social body has become a moral concern, for supposedly anybody can make their frame-work a ‘work of art’ and attain that longed for paradise of the ‘perfect’ body, the body as a sign of virility and traditional masculinity. You only have to exercise and build that lean, hard look, have your tummy tucked or face reconstructed, take those steroids to make your body into a sculpture …

Your body could be a work of art if only you would let it …

Anonymous photographer
Make your body a work of art
‘Body Sculpture’ brochure
1998

Marcus Bunyan (Australian, b. 1958)
Andy in the flat, Punt Road, South Yarra
1991-1992
Gelatin silver print

Re-Pressing, responsibility and respect

Bodies and images of the body signify their meaning through representation. How can we re-press the representation of the male body so that we can offer alternative images to gay men that will act as fantasies for them? According to John Tagg25 we must demonstrate that the meaning of already dominant images within a society can be negated and rendered incoherent. Tagg says there are 2 ways of doing this:

1. “We must search for other signifying conventions, other orders of meaning already present in the culture (through conflict of classes, ideologies and forms of control) that are denied a semiotic space to express themselves.” (Semiotics is the study of signs)

2. “We must abandon the above search for other forms of meaning in bodies and body images and adopt images that refuse any meaning at all – bodies and images of them cannot be read or possessed and therefore may come to mean nothing. In other words the image does not signify anything, much like the early non-sexual androgynous ‘figure’ of the gay liberation movement. The figure had no ascertainable gender, even though the body was still actively sexual.”

Personally I think that the second option would be very difficult to achieve on a broad social level.

Body images are understood through ‘conditions of understanding’, in other words how their meaning is understood is through a collective knowledge of the history of context, place and the language that those images speak in. Images are the main source of sensual stimulation in contemporary society and their language is learnt from an early age.

To culturally deny this language would be a very difficult thing to achieve. The first option has a greater possibility of success: that we can open up spaces for images that have previously been denied the room to speak for themselves. This is especially true in regard to the dominance of images of the muscular mesomorph within gay society. We must try and propose different body image types as fantasies for gay men and give them the space within the community to express themselves!

The image below is a good example of allowing other orders of meaning already present within images in our culture to speak for themselves. The photograph below is another form of re-pressentation of the male body image that usually finds no representative space within the context of gay media. These kind of images do offer themselves as alternative fantasy images for gay men but are often denied the space to express themselves and therefore reach a larger audience of gay men. Here I am, accept me for who I am.

Anonymous photographer
Untitled
1998
Image from a personal gay web page

An understanding of re-pressentation is the responsibility of every gay man. It is an ability to be able to respond (which is what responsibility means) to his own needs and the needs of others in a voluntary, altruistic and non-discriminatory way. It implies a care and concern for others as well as for the self. This is a hope, a dream if you like, but a good dream all the same. I suggest that, above all, responsibility for the acceptance of difference in others requires an understanding and respect towards yourself.

As Erich Fromm has said more eloquently than I can ever say,

“Respect is not fear and awe, it denotes, in accordance with the root of the word (respicere = to look at), the ability to see a person as he is, to be aware of his unique individuality. Respect means the concern that the other person should grow and unfold as he is. Respect, thus, implies the absence of exploitation … It is clear respect is possible only if I have achieved independence; if I can stand and walk without needing crutches, without having to dominate and exploit anyone else. Respect exists only on the basis of freedom … To respect a person is not possible without knowing him; care and responsibility would be blind if they were not guided by knowledge. Knowledge would be empty if it were not motivated by concern. There are many layers of knowledge; the knowledge which is an aspect of love is one which does not stay at the periphery, but penetrates to the core. It is possible only when I can transcend the concern for myself and see the other person in his own terms.”26 (My bold)

I think this is a fantastic way to view our relationship with the world.

Respect, responsibility, care, and concern are key words in this positive relationship with ourselves and with others, which I believe will increase self-esteem by surrounding both with good energy. I realise that this may be very difficult to put into practice all of the time but if we could try then I believe the world can become a healthier, more balanced place.

Marcus Bunyan. ‘Self-portrait in Punk Jacket’ 1991-1992 from the series ‘Self-portraits and nudes’ 1991-1992

Marcus Bunyan (Australian born England, b. 1958)
Self-portrait in Punk Jacket
1991-1992
From the series Self-portraits and nudes 1991-1992
Gelatin silver print

Re-imag(in)ing the male body

“Modern man is alienated from himself, from his fellow men, and from nature. He has been transformed into a commodity, experiences his life forces as an investment which must bring him the maximum profit obtainable under existing market conditions. Human relations are essentially those of alienated automatons, each basing his security on staying close to the herd, and not being different in thought, feeling or action. While everybody tries to be as close as possible to the rest, everybody remains utterly alone, pervaded by the deep sense of insecurity, anxiety and guilt which always results when human separateness cannot be overcome …” (My bold)

Erich Fromm27

Marcus Bunyan (Australian born England, b. 1958)
Untitled
1995
From the series Sleep/Wound
Gelatin silver print

In the series of photographs I try to explore the gay male body not from the usual viewpoint of desire but from the viewpoint of intimacy, touch, affection and love. The infrared images are the positions of sleep of myself and my partner. If people find them erotic then that is their reading of the photographs. They are not meant to be. They explore an area of imagery of the male body which I think has been totally overlooked – male2male intimacy. An early example of this intimacy is a photograph by Minor White (below). Few have really developed this theme further. This is an imagery not as reliant on the posing, hard bodied, clench fisted, body as phallus orientated iconography so prevalent in contemporary male society. It is an example of imagery that has yet to find a semiotic space to express itself.

We seek to belong to a society that values coherence and conformity whilst promoting ‘individuality’. Staying close to the herd; not being different in thought, feeling or action; assuming masks; the replaceability and interchangeability of bodies. These are all conditions of this supposed ‘individuality’ in contemporary society, a society that is really afraid of any expression of difference and diversity. The gay community, long priding itself on valuing diversity, is equally guilty of this charge. Gay becomes a ‘performativity’,28 a repetition of rituals which does result in a loss of individuality, the subsuming of the individual into the ‘team’.

“The idea of being one’s self is often expressed as “doing one’s own thing.” We can say that one is being himself when he is doing (or thinking) what he really wants to do (or think). When, however, one is acting in a way that is intended to appeal to others or to a code of behaviour that does not come naturally to him, he is not “doing his own thing” at all. He is, in fact, “doing someone else’s thing.”29

A gay man may not really be ‘doing his own thing’ as he would like to think, but ‘doing someone else’s thing’, doing what every-body else is doing. This conformity is enforced by gay men themselves. Not society but individual will, the will to be part of the ‘team’; to seamlessly belong. Erich Fromm has said this is union by conformity. “In contemporary capitalistic society the meaning of equality has been transformed. By equality one refers to the equality of automatons; of men who have lost their individuality. Equality today means ‘sameness’, rather than ‘oneness’.”30

Of course, we are all convinced that we follow our own desires but in the gay community we see how these desires can be shaped to fit in with a standardised ‘ideal’ in regards to male body image, in order to become ‘the same’. I believe that gay men must try to negate and transcend the power inherently embodied in stereotypical representations of male body images. Says Chris Schilling,

“If our embodied experiences negate dominant conceptions of gender roles, for example, there is the basis for the creation or support of alternative views about men and women … It is important to note that not all bodies are changed in accordance with dominant images of masculinity and femininity, and there is much individuals can do to develop their bodies in different directions.”30 (My italics)

Minor White (American, 1908-1976)
Ernest Stones and Robert Bright (San Francisco)
1949
Gelatin silver print
in Bunnell, Peter. Minor White: The Eye That Shapes. Bulfinch Press, 1989, Figure 32

Negative No. 2342I. ‘Ernest Stones and Robert Bright’. 1949. 6″ x 6″ contact print (?)

One of my favourite Minor White photographs. Same men as above but lighter skin tones. Richness – tonality in shirts is amazing. Much more contrast than the reproduction, Plate 32 in Bunnell, Peter. Minor White: The Eye That Shapes. Boston: Bulfinch Press/Princeton University, 1989. Much more clarity than the reproduction, Plate 62 in Ellenzweig, Allen. The Homoerotic Photograph. New York: Columbia University Press, 1992, p. 111.

The presence of the hand on the shoulder is incredible. Such an intimate image between two men!

Bunyan, Marcus. “Research notes on photographs from the Minor White Archive,” Princeton University, New Jersey, 06/08/1999.

Marcus Bunyan (Australian born England, b. 1958)
Untitled
1995
From the series Sleep/Wound
Gelatin silver print

Through our lived experience, our history of body, it’s context and it’s language, it is possible to support and encourage alternative ways that gay men can look at their own and other men’s bodies. As Michelangelo Signorile said it is possible to remember a time when we liked different types of bodies; we can promote an acceptance of different fantasies in regards to gender role representation that help support alternative views of masculinity, that help create a multiplicity of desires, because we have all previously desired different types of bodies.

As Naomi Wolf in her seminal book The Beauty Myth notes, “The shape and weight and texture and feel of bodies is crucial to pleasure but the appealing body will not be identical … The world of attraction grows blander and colder as everyone, first women and soon men, begin to look alike.”31

As gay men our personal experience of the feel of male bodies is crucial to an acceptance of difference. In the fluctuation of body image and identity boundaries through the interaction of bodies in sex, gay men may begin to explore the possibility of new forms of pleasure. But it would seem to me that gay men, instead of inventing new pleasures, constantly repeat and reiterate an old limiting pleasure, the desire for stereotypical muscular body image ideals. In the desire for intimacy, connection and possession of a man that has the signifier of the ‘ideal’ muscular mesomorphic body image, gay men may have multiple intimate sexual encounters that do not reinvent pleasure but repeatedly seek to confirm existing ‘ideals’ of social reproduction. This is not a multiplicity of pleasures expressed through a desire for different forms, but the expression of a singular, monocular pleasure that validates the social worth of one body-type.

The multiplicity of casual sexual encounters might open a gay man up to new experiences but these experiences are based on a desire for the fixed form of a solid, stable, secure, traditional masculine body. This is not a dissolution of boundaries to reinvent new pleasures but the reinforcement of traditional patriarchal masculine stereotypes that promotes discrimination against gay men who do not possess this kind of body. In revealing themselves in intimate casual sexual encounters by having unsafe sex with a muscular body image ‘ideal’ gay men may be exploring the diversity and difference of man sex in liberating but possibly dangerous ways, ways born out of desperation and desire to possess the body image ‘ideal’ that may be evidenced through a nihilistic lack of care, concern and responsibility for the inner Self and a lack of respect for others.

Expanding on a quotation by Kenneth Dutton I observe that: “The feminist struggle to overcome stereotypical images and open-up to women a range of options as to the roles they may wish to play, free of the male-imposed constraints of traditional socio-sexual expectation, is yet to find its masculine counterpart”31 in the body images of the male within the gay community.

Overcoming stereotypical images means first overcoming the hype of the hyper-masculine body. Strength in itself is not power but this type of muscular body is increasingly seen as powerful within the gay community. For some gay men a desire for the power of patriarchy is evidenced in their desire for these ‘ripped’ bodies with their ‘shredded’ muscle (both, ironically, terms of disembodiment and therefore dehumanisation) as proof that they are ‘real’ masculine men. The supposed irony present in gay male sex and sexuality, of one man fucking another man to disrupt the ‘norms’ of hegemonic masculinity has, I believe, disappeared in a reaffirmation of traditional forms of masculine identity.

The power of beauty is no longer the power of the effete, the weak, the hidden, but the power of the muscularly visible. Judgements made by gay men on other gay men depend to a significant degree on the representation of this power through the possession of the form of the muscular body, the desire for it’s hardness and strength dictated by the collective desire of a gay male sexual orientation. Gay men must be made more aware that this collective desire is based on traditional forms of hegemonic masculinity replete with the discriminations that this identity construction entails. Learning from past histories and experiences we must try to stop such conditions being repeated so that discrimination does not exist in future identities.

Marcus Bunyan (Australian born England, b. 1958)
Untitled
1995
From the series Sleep/Wound
Gelatin silver print

We must work to expand the underlying societal attitude of what is seen as the desirable ‘look’ of the gay male body in order to open up different body-types as fantasies for gay men. It is gay men’s (re)actions in regards to bodies of all types that is important. We must encourage a personal self-acceptance that increases self-esteem through achievement. This may include going to the gym to develop your body but this activity should be undertaken with an awareness of all the issues involved in such a quest. As Michael East comments,

“At the end of the day, we as men have to do what the women have had to do to cope with body image pressure for the last 50 years: ie., accept ourselves as we are. Ultimately, no matter how big our muscles are, how cool an exterior we can project, or how mental, agile or superior we pretend we are, we too are human, and must set our own bench marks, and not use others. At the end of the day, it comes down to how you feel about your body. No matter what size or shape you’re in, if you are cool about it – that is of primary importance.”33 (My italics and bold).

He goes on to suggest several strategies that help promote an acceptance of body image:

1/ “Make a deal with yourself that you are going to stop giving yourself a hard time about it. With a clear head and less subjective approach to the situation you’ll be better equipped to take stock of what the real issues are, and these could have nothing to do with your body at all.

2/ Clear out the junk – negative thoughts about yourself, the world, what you’re doing with your life [basically self-actualization]. This also includes associates that subtly or otherwise give you a hard time about your body shape/size.

3/ If your house or private space is furnished with nothing but multitudes of images of semi naked men with great bods, why not take them down for a while to give yourself a more neutral space to take stock?

4/ Focus on other aspects of yourself. Unless you’ve convinced yourself that you are a complete loser, list all the good things that you have done with your life, an all the good things about you that people compliment you on.” [Increasing self-esteem through achievement]

I think that the last point is vitally important. Body image is part of an overall self-esteem package and feeling better about yourself overall will help you feel better about your body. Conversely, feeling better about your body by getting in shape, going to the gym for the right reasons, can help improve your overall self-esteem. Self-esteem is built through the acceptance and achievement of an integrated identity, valuing all parts of the self. Its no good going to the gym and getting a great body if you haven’t sorted out other issues in your life because you’ll still think that you look like crap anyway! Then you’ll want bigger muscles and an even better body thinking this will improve your self-esteem and be the solution to your problems34 ….

Conclusion

I will conclude this chapter with an eloquent quotation by Wendy Chapkis and a few comments from myself. I believe that this quotation is a fitting summation to this chapter and perhaps to the whole research project. It most closely expresses and reflects – through the spiritually succinct words of someone I admire – ideas and thoughts on the subject matter that have evolved as this research project has developed to fruition.

“The politics of appearance inextricably bound up with the structures of social, political and economic inequality … Fighting pressure to conform, attempting to hold one’s own against the commercial and cultural images of the acceptable is a crucial first act of resistance. The attempt to pass and blend in actually hides us from those we most resemble. We end up robbing each other of authentic reflections of ourselves. Instead, imperfectly visible behind a fashion of conformity, we fear to meet each others’ eyes … Real diversity can only become a source of strength if we learn to acknowledge it rather than disguise it. Only then can we recognize each other as different and therefore exciting, imperfect and as such enough.”35 (My italics)

Our difference and diversity is our strength as gay people.
We must not crush our difference through discrimination.
We must not hide our diversity behind masks.
We must resist commercial and cultural images of the acceptable.

Yes we are imperfect and what an exciting perfection it is!

Dr Marcus Bunyan 2001

Footnotes

1/ Signorile, Michelangelo. Life Outside: The Signorile Report on Gay Men: Sex, Drugs, Muscles, and the Passages of Life. New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 1997, pp. 298-299.

2/ Interview with Taylor, Barry. Melbourne. 01/07/1997. Manager of the Victorian State Youth Suicide Prevention Programme 1996 and now working with gay people on mental health issues.

3/ Ridge, Damien. “Queer Connections: Community, ‘the Scene’ and an Epidemic,” in Journal of Contemporary Ethnography June 1996, pp. 15-16.

4/ Hatfield, Elaine and Sprecher, Susan. Mirror, Mirror: The Importance of Looks in Everyday Life. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1986, p. 313.

5/ Benson, Lou. Images, Heroes and Self-Perceptions. New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, 1974, p. 30.

6/ Fromm, Erich. The Art of Loving. London: Allen and Unwin, 1957, quoted in Benson, Lou. Images, Heroes and Self-Perceptions. New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, 1974, p. 30.

7/ “… body attractiveness is so highly valued that it has the single most important impact on many individuals feelings of physical self-worth. Physical self-worth affects self-esteem.”

Wankel, Leonard. “Self-Esteem and Body Image: The Research File: information for professionals from the Canadian Fitness and Lifestyle Research Institute,” in Canadian Medical Association Journal 153 (5). September 1st, 1995, p. 607.

See also Berscheid, E., Hatfield (Walster), E. and Bohrnstedt, G. “The Happy American Body: A Survey Report,” in Psychology Today 7. 1973, pp. 119-131.

8/ “Low self-esteem is associated with depression and may contribute to suicidal behaviour (Rutter, 1986) … throughout adolescence, self-esteem appears to be affected by young people’s judgements of their competence in certain valued domains (Harter, 1990). Domains identified as important include physical attractiveness, acceptance by peers, and, to a lesser extent, academic competence, athletic ability, and conduct.”

Crockett, L. and Peterson, A. “Adolescent Development: Health Risks and Opportunities,” in Millstein, S. and Peterson, A. and Nightingale, E. (eds.,). Promoting the Health of Adolescents. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993, p. 19.

Rutter, M. “The Developmental Psychopathology of Depression: Issues and Perspectives,” in Rutter, M. and Izard, C. and Read, P. (eds.,). Depression in Young People: Developmental and Clinical Perspectives. New York: Guilford, 1986.

Harter, S. “Self and Identity Development,” in Feldman, S.S. and Elliott, G.R. (eds.,). At the Threshold: The Developing Adolescent. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1990.

9/ Hatfield and Sprecher, 1986, Op cit. p. 123.

10/ Signorile, 1997, Op cit. pp. 226-227.

11/ “For gay men, sex, the most powerful implement of attachment and arousal, is also an agent of communion, replacing an often hostile family and even shaping politics.”

Goldstein, Richard. “Heartsick: Fear and Loving in the Gay Community,” in The Village Voice June 28th, 1983, quoted in Watney, Simon. “The Rhetoric of AIDS,” in Wallis, Brian (ed.,). Blasted Allegories. Cambridge, Mass: The MIT Press, 1987, p. 165.

12/ “We have noted earlier that the hero in our society is often depicted as a loner, a man without ties. This encourages people to wear the mask of the loner while inside their need for community remains unfulfilled. There results a kind of taboo on closeness and affiliation in our overt behaviour, while unconsciously the longing continues to cause us great distress.”

Benson, 1974, Op cit p. 397.

13/ Benson, 1974, Op cit p. 397.

14/ MB: Self-actualization is concerned not just with end product, but in the actual experience of the process itself, whether it is baking a cake, playing the piano, going to the gym, or having sex. We can both enjoy the actual process and the outcome FOR WHAT THEY ARE, not what we would like them to be.

“[An] important area in which self-actualizing people differ from others is in their non judgmental acceptance of themselves … They can accept their own human nature in the stoic style, with all its shortcomings, with all its discrepancies from the ideal image without feeling real concern. Such feeling of comfort and acceptance with the self are extremely important in terms of laying down a tone that underlies a person’s whole existence.”

Benson, 1974, Op cit p. 356-357.

15/ Maslow, A. Motivation and Personality. New York: Harper & Row, 1970 cited in Benson, 1974, Op cit pp. 356-357.

16/ Signorile, 1997, Op cit. pp. 267-268.

17/ Interview with Taylor, Barry. Melbourne. 01/07/1997. Manager of the Victorian State Youth Suicide Prevention Programme 1996 and now working with gay people on mental health issues.

18/ Lakoff, Robin and Scherr, Raquel. Face Value: The Politics of Beauty. Boston: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1984, p. 284.

19/ Houston, R. “The Way We Wear,” in Gay News Vol. 131. 1978, p. 14, quoted in Blachford, Gregg. “Male Dominance and the Gay World,” in Plummer, Kenneth (ed.,). The Making of the Modern Homosexual. London: Hutchinson, 1981, p. 191.

20/ Roddick, Anita (ed.,). “The Body and Self Esteem,” in Full Voice Issue One. Australia: Adidem Pty. Ltd., 1997.

21/ Blachford, Gregg. “Male Dominance and the Gay World,” in Plummer, Kenneth (ed.,). The Making of the Modern Homosexual. London: Hutchinson, 1981, p. 191.

22/ Mann, William J. “Perfect Bound,” in XY Magazine No.7. California: XY Publishing, April/May 1997, pp. 26-28.

23/Michelangelo Signorile quoted in Mann, 1997, Op cit pp. 26-28.

24/ “It is not through any intrinsic quality of the sign but rather through the interpretative acts of members of a sign community that the sign comes to have meaning. Hence the transmutability of all signs, their capacity to serve as signified and signifier, independent of their physical properties.”

Stewart, Susan. On Longing: Narratives of the Miniature, the Gigantic, the Souvenir, the Collection. Durham: Duke University Press, 1993, p. 32.

25/ Tagg, John. The Burden of Representation: Essays on Photographies and Histories. Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1988, pp. 101-102.

26/ Fromm, Erich. The Art of Loving. London: Allen and Unwin, 1957, pp. 28-29.

27/ Ibid., pp. 28-29.

28/ “I would suggest that ‘performativity’ cannot be understood outside of a process of iterability, a regularized and constrained repetition of norms. And this repetition is not performed by a subject; this repetition is what enables a subject and constitutes the temporal condition for the subject. This iterability implies that “performance” is not a singular “act” or event, but a ritualized production, a ritual reiterated under and through constraint, under and through the force of prohibition and taboo, with the threat of ostracism and even death controlling and compelling the shape of the production, but not, I will insist, determining it fully in advance.”

Butler, Judith. Bodies That Matter. New York: Routledge, 1993, pp. 94-95.

“The validation of gay bodies in sex becomes, in Judith Butler’s terms, both ‘citational’ and ‘performative’, where gay men quote their own ‘norms’ of desirability and performance in order not to be named ‘other’, in order to belong and be seen as the ‘same’. And in seeing yourself as a ‘real’ man, I think this ‘performativity’ and ‘citationality’ may have become hidden from view in the deception of gay men seeing themselves as the same. If you do not match up to these ‘normalities’ of interaction then I wonder how much real emotional involvement there is, especially when the negotiation skills of some gay men are not as developed as Gary Dowsett would like to think. Producing sexually proficient men in sexually vital bodies is no longer a hands on task within the gay community, but rather the emotionally uninvolving experience of sexual jurisprudence, a sighting of the law of sexual performance that is not seen as such by gay men.”

Bunyan, Marcus. ‘Sex and Sensibility: Gay Eth(n)ics into the New Millennium’ paper presented at HID3, Proceedings of the 3rd National Lesbian, Gay, Transgender and Bisexual Health Conference, Adelaide, South Australia, 1999

29/ Benson, 1974, Op cit pp. 4-5.

30/ Fromm, 1957 Op cit p. 19.

31/ Wolf, Naomi. The Beauty Myth. London: Vintage, 1991, pp. 176-177.

32/ Dutton, Kenneth. The Perfectible Body. London: Cassell, 1995, p. 373.

33/ East, Michael. “Mirror, Mirror … Exploring men’s body image,” in McLean, Max (ed.,). Melbourne Star Observer Issue 494. Body & Soul. Melbourne: Satellite Media, 29th October 1999, p. 12.

34/ “”I want to be physical perfection in the eyes(most important) of gay men – totally physically appealing, like the ultimate. The perfect tits and butt, bulbous biceps. I want to achieve symmetry, big and in proportion. I would look like the cover of an HX [Homo Xtra, a New York bar giveaway known for its covers of hot men] – lean, sculpted, muscular, virile, a stallion, a guy that would make your mouth water. I want to know what it’s like to walk down the street and have everyone look at you, absolutely everyone. I want to know what it’s like to really feel like an object.” What does he believe all of this will do for him? “Honestly, and I’m embarrassed to say it, but I’m hoping it will boost my self-esteem,” he admits. “I don’t know how to boost my self-esteem now. My feeling is, ‘Get a great body and people will admire you. Get a great body and everything will be okay’ … It’s this belief that if I can just get the perfect body, then I wouldn’t be insecure.””

Signorile, Michelangelo. Life Outside: The Signorile Report on Gay Men: Sex, Drugs, Muscles, and the Passages of Life. New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 1997, p. 4.

35/ Chapkis, Wendy. Beauty Secrets: Women and the Politics of Appearance. Boston: South End Press, 1986, p. 175.

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