8 November to 15 December 2025
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Summer Salon
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Local talent and New acquisitions
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An overview of our passion in photography. From the famous to the soon to be and some that should be famous. This is a survey show that covers our collecting over the last few years and some work by two outstanding locals.
Featuring: Jessie Dinan, Gerry Angelos and Henri Cartier-Bresson, Anne Noble, Eve Arnold, Wolfgang Sievers, John Gollings, Robert Capa, Pedro Meyer, Weegee, Tina Modotti, George Washington Wilson and others
An introduction:
This is our summer show. It is an opportunity to give first time viewers a sense of what the gallery is about. We accept that photography is a medium used for many different motivations, it might be to sell, to make people think, to be a memory personal or public it may be many other things. As a gallery we are interested in this breadth and history of the medium, displaying photographs from the 1840s until now. Our emphasis is on being a place that people who love photography can be see what is happening around them in Victoria and see the vast history of the medium. In this exhibition we have on display photographs the gallery has purchased over the last 18 months alongside two of the most interesting and talented local photographers we come across in our survey exhibitions.
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This catalogue is a little different than our usual ones, in that through the works on display the text will be as concerned with explaining issues around collecting that a print in each artist/theme set brings up. This follows on from our exhibitions, From Dags to Digital which spoke to the commercial print processes from the history of photography and This Thing; Photography which looked at photography’s cultural force. We see ourselves as a place to be inspired to learn more about the medium and its history and that enthusiasm might be the gateway to being a collector of this thing we love.
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Since the 1970s photography has been on the radar of the big and important galleries around the world. In 1988 it was possible to buy important photographs for USD300 now they sell for USD5000+. It is not just the first tier work that is worth collecting. I posit that second and third tier is also important. We are interested in history and importance of photographs. Some photographs, like band publicity photos were made in great numbers and thus are not expensive to buy, yet you can get a silver gelatin image made by an important photographer for AUD10-100. The influence of images is often great on our culture. Though we do not have any of these in this exhibition we do have many other photographs made for various reasons from photos on file to show perspective clients to prints made to the rigors of perfection to be exhibited.
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Photography is the only one of the major art media that one can have a masterpiece on the wall at a weeks basic income. It may not be true if you are seeking a ‘tick all the boxes’ exhibition print but it is if you are seeking out objects that have touched the artist’s hands and are in their preferred photographic process.
Unknown UK Photographer ~1860s
This is a suite of 14 photographs and provides one of the joys of collecting. There is no indication of the photographer and locations. So the fun of the research hunt begins. The auction house is convinced that they were made on Wye Valley & Welsh Borders, dated then to 1860s. The prints are Albumens which started to make their mark in 1855 and gained momentum by 1860, and was popular until the 1890s. The other thing that is interesting is this was the period of the great documentation in the UK and other places around Europe. To have and album of photographs of somewhere you visited or wanted to visit became popular. In a united kingdom context this meant famous churches and other buildings and places of great beauty. This body of work is unusual, as it is very local. An educated guess is this is the work of a photographic studio that was based near where the photographs were made. The question is exactly where and who made the photos.
Anne Noble
Anne Noble is an important New Zealand/ Aotearoa photographer. This from one of her earlier bodies of work. They are silver gel prints. Two are notated and signed on verso the other does not have anything versa. The project was the documentation of the sugar refinery in Auckland. Anne is presented as a contemporary artist rather than just a photographer. This puts her work in that category. As such it brings to the table the contemporary art collectors and they tend to pay much more than people who only are interested in photography. In the 1970s the place of photographs in collections fundamentally changed. Major galleries opened photography departments. This coincided with two social developments, the rise of feminism and of gay rights. In Australia women were graduating from art colleges looking to take up positions in curation. These new departments were open to them in a way that contemporary or traditional art departments were not. Thus in art photography in Australia we have a female bias where as most other media has a male bias.
George Washington Wilson and others
George Washington Wilson was one of the England’s most prolific and important photographers of the 19thC. He documented much of England, commissioning photographers to make work in his style and standard across the empire, including Melbourne. He was not alone in doing this survey of the country and its places of interest. The three images displayed are of places that Shakespeare was associated with, the house and room he was born and the church he was buried. GWW signed his prints on the glass plate, of which the room photographs shows. The other two photos are by an unknown photographer/s. There were a group of photographers working in the United Kingdom at this time. The gallery is currently putting together a set of all of England’s most important cathedrals by G.W.W. Although his work is relatively cheap examples are in the NGV, Albert and Victoria, the Getty and The Met. Each year the number of prints available reduces as museums collect them, never to enter the market again. These prints were mass produced and are relatively common though they do fade over time when exposed to UV light. These introduce a second aspect of collecting, photographs of/or associated with fame. Further these are in excellent condition considering they are around 140 years old, in collecting condition is very important.
Eve Arnold
Eve Arnold was the first female to become a member of Magnum photo agency. She was trained in photography by Alexey Brodovitch the art director of Harper’s Bazaar. Her perspective on life was unlike the male photographers that dominated the industry at the time. Through Magnum she was commissioned by the important magazines like Picture Post and Life. She photographed many of most important figures of the 20th century. Like Marilyn Monroe and other famous women, whom she became friends thus she was able to make images that express a same gender understanding, rather than a male gaze. Since the 1970s there has been a lot of research into the archive and a reappraisal of many of the ignored women from the past. Arnold had her first exhibition in 1980. A couple of notes. This print has major damage to the top right corner which devalues it however it also has two notations verso. For my beloved friend Robert - without whom etc - but in case it is true - i would not have written these books - Love and gratitude Eve 1994 Sailor and his family Newport (two words we can’t understand) 1956 Eve Arnold Thus signed by the artist. The provenance of this work includes Eve signing twice, once just ‘Eve’ the other her full name. The notation confirms it was in the hands of the artist and that it is a gift adds kudos. So there is a play off between the damage and the intimacy of the print to the artist, thus not appealing to the collector who is willing to spend 10K+ but for those of us who can overlook the damage...
Wolfgang Sievers
We have prints from the beginning and the later parts of his career. The early prints are silver gelatins the later are colour prints. Sievers grew up in Germany his father was an art and architecture scholar and his mother an educator. He made photos for his father’s books, which includes this photograph. His thinking was very much in line with New Objectivity. Being Jewish and the rise of the a difficult political class he decided to leave in 1938, first to the UK then Melbourne. Here he met Helmut Newton and his wife June Browne (aka Alice Springs). New Visions in Photography was a joint exhibition that introduced Australia to the Bauhaus and other new German perspectives, and changed the industry here. Sievers went on to be the most in demand industrial photographer though the second half of the 20thC. The early prints were ‘agency prints’ that is prints made to be on file to keep a record of the best work with a view to sell licenses to use the photo. This image is stamped verso with hand written notations regarding the subject. It also comes with a slip with studio details, including the note that a vintage print was sold to the National Gallery of Australia. The later prints were made for exhibition, both art and for commerce.
John Gollings
John Gollings has been Australia’s foremost architectural photographer since the early 1970s, though he participated in other genres. He recently retired and sold off much of his archive. I often wonder about Gollings success in the Art world. He is an older white heterosexual male, who makes commercial work. In his favour is the skill shown in the making of the images and the following he built up through the display of his images via magazines and other media. His work is often colourful, loves late light and blue hour. He had a lot of freedom in making of the images, even for clients. He also had passion projects, like documenting the Gold Coast, Vijanagara, South India. We often forget that until the late 19th Century most painting that we consider great was commissions. Great works of art often have patrons. Michaelangelo’s Sistine Chapel was paid for. As the power of the merchant classes increased, there became more outlets for artists to do work that did not reflect the needs/desires of a client. Perhaps this is why we can’t get over the French impressionists as they were the greatest move in personal expression? As a gallery we accept many forms of photography, our goal and interest is photography that makes a viewer stop and consider. If there is a client or not is not the major concern. It is interesting to know what the purpose for the creation of the work is. Once a photographer wins the tournament, they are given grace to interpret the client brief as they wish rarely with criticism. This is the point that Gollings has been at for decades.
Jessie Dinan
Small Town Rodeo is a series of images here belong to an ongoing photographic project titled ‘Small Town Rodeo’. I’m looking to build a body of work that captures the spirit of rural Australian life and rodeo culture. In 2017 after relocating back from the states, I needed an escape from city life and challenged myself to go photograph something completely foreign to me and out of my comfort zone. One of those places was the Deni ute muster, a yearly event held in rural New South Wales. A celebration of Aussie culture, utes, booze and country music, it was here that I found myself at my very first rodeo! This 3 day trip sparked my continued fascination documenting and travelling to small town rodeos around Australia. I find the action behind
