Camera shenanigans

I have been receiving positive feedback about my research into vernacular photography. This is encouraging, as a decade I met with negative responses to my ongoing study everyday photography.

Here are some more views taken by an itinerant Scots visitor to New Zealand in 1928. This gutsy snapshooter had a natural photographic ability and a quirky affection for personal adventure. She was insistent with her friends and she recorded them using a very directorial approach. The people that she assembled for her images all became performers for her photographic ‘event’.

Here is Hanging Rock Creek. Have you ever encountered a more hilarious way to sit in a tree with your mother and aunt? Notice that they are smiling but he does not. He is clearly not yet related to her but obviously there is a romantic interest from her perspective.


These two Diamond Harbour snapshots are terrific. The young man previously perched in the tree is again shown at the centre of the shot, but he still remains totally deadpan and smileless. What should we call his bathing costume because it is obviously 'pre-togs'. A colleague called his gear 'pre-ORCA', which is specific and meaningful but not useful as a period descriptor. Swimming costume? Bathers? Probably made of blue serge wool which, when wet, would have felt like wearing knitted slime. An Australian friend told me that 'bathers' is the most accurate terminology.

Maybe this recurring man is actually the photographer’s local boyfriend. Other photographs in the album show that she was really keen on him. Were guys actually called ‘boyfriends’ in 1928? His Mum is again at the right hand side with her sister steadfastly at her right. Is this photographer always telling her subjects where to stand?



She certainly is being bossy in this image but with what a hazing humour. The figures are laid out like a Banks Peninsula version of Édouard Manet’s painting Le Déjeuner sur l’herbe. Look at how the woman cradles her head. It does not make any sense to ask why they are acting out these wacky poses because they are simply responding to what the photographer is requesting of them. Camera shenanigans.


An even more astonishing example of social buffoonery is the antics they get up to after lunch at Diamond Harbour when four of the picnic-ers go in for some rudimentary handstands. It puts playing up for the camera into perspective - make a fool of oneself and laugh along with the camera’s record. Such an amusing and self-deprecating touch to everyday photography is still charmingly uncommon. In 1928, it was positively rare.

The Wonderland Album – New Zealand Part 2

I searched Google for “Wonderland” and “New Zealand” and came up with 889,000 references. There is Boogie Wonderland, Geothermal Wonderland and even Pets Wonderland. Still, Wonderland is not a term that has retained its currency in New Zealand. Even though it is a terrific title for this 19th century photograph album.



Otira Gorge, West Coast Road (1999/18/74) is a spectacularly cold and wintertime view of one of the most accessible alpine passes in the South Island. Alfred Burton’s assistant looks very game wearing his shirtsleeves in such icy weather. Without his roadside presence it would be much harder to see the lofty scale of the distant mountains.


I reckon Burton's photograph of The Blue Bath, Rotorua (1999/18/150) is surreal and hilarious at the same moment. This pool looks so large but it is shown totally empty of bathers. Frequently, such late 19th century images of public pools included bathing figures - and they were always male - as a means of indicating the pool's scale. I like the abstraction of the composition and I reckon that the famous modernist architectural photographer Julius Shulman would be jealous of this shot!


Interior of crater, after eruption June 10 1886 (1999/18/177) is a brutally 'explosive' image. No one who has visited the top of the crater of Mount Tarawera ever fails to feel overwhelmed by how extensive the 1886 eruption was. I went there once in winter and it was like visiting the after-effects of a cataclysm By including the two ‘spectator’ figures, Burton affirms the old art tradition of having witnesses podering a sublime vista. Who would call the place they are looking at 'Wonderland'?

Image credits:

The Wonderland Album – New Zealand circa 1898-1899
Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tamaki
The Ilene and Laurence Dakin Bequest, purchased 1999
1999/18/1-184

The Wonderland Album – New Zealand Part 1

Currently on show in Picturing History, we have on display The Wonderland Album – New Zealand. We made an accompanying DVD featuring all the photographic images within the album so that visitors to the exhibition could view the contents in the sequence that they have in the bound volume. I acquired The Wonderland Album for the Auckland Art Gallery’s collection in 1999 from the Peter McLeavey Gallery, where it had been in Peter’s own private collection.

Bound in Moroccan goatskin, blind-stamped and tooled with gold leaf, the album is a really impressive object. It contains 184 albumen photographs all of which are in exceptional condition. We do not know who created the album but it appears to have been assembled in the last five years of the 1890s by someone who had significant means.

The Wonderland Album – New Zealand is, arguably, one of the most important assemblages of 19th century topographical photography. Almost all the photographs were created by Alfred Burton (1834 – 1914), although there are some by James Valentine (1815 – 1880) and also an unknown photographer.

I made a selection of some of my favourite images by Alfred Burton -

Ruined Wharepuni, Whakahoro, Wanganui River (1999/18/43) appears to date from the May 1885 trip that Alfred Burton made down the Wanganui River. This image comes from one of the most important sequences of photographs made in New Zealand during the 19th century. The Wharepuni must date from the mid-century.



Gigantic cabbage trees, Papakai, King Country (1999/18/63) is a beguiling image. The Cabbage tree, or Ti tree (Cordyline australis), at right appears to be dying from some disease and the landscape looks as if it has just been prepared for farming.



Lake Taupo from Motutere (1999/18/66) is another photograph from 1885. Burton made a number of views at this location on the same day but this is the most interesting one in terms of its novel composition. He always had an eye on what would be a saleable image so the abstract quality of this work, with its against the light viewpoint (what we call contrejour) is especially notable.



Taupaki Kauri Bush (1999/18/71) was taken on the forest property of Mr M.H. Roe and is one of a number of Burton's brilliant photographs of Kauri milling. By including the timber workers, we see a portrait of 19th century industry that is not as commonly found as we would expect from photographs of the period.

Image credits:

The Wonderland Album – New Zealand circa 1898-1899
Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tamaki
The Ilene and Laurence Dakin Bequest, purchased 1999
1999/18/1-184

Playtime

I found a new gadget over the weekend. http://tiltshiftmaker.com/allows you to upload a photo and then renders it to appear like a miniature world or model. I couldnt resist having a go with the main gallery and here are the results!

It was then pointed out to me that you cant see Rangitoto from the same viewpoint any more and the above photo is an older image. here is a miniature version of what it looks like now:

Snapshots - 12

Still on the fascinating topic of sports snapshots, here are two different stunners. Coach Nobby Connolly stands at right - coaches always seem to be standing on the right in such shots . Surprisingly, he is not wearing his hat. Neither is his younger assistant coach, at the team's left. Look at the stain marks impressed at the left and right. This snap has been attached to some wall with a drawing pin for many years. There is tobacco staining on the photo's rear. The year is 1933 and the competitive Opawa Rugby team has just defeated another rugby team. From peering at this picture it becomes obvious that these guys have taken part in such a team portrait before. Just see what they are doing with their arms. Sad to consider that within a few years some of these men will go to the War.



What a weird background for a home-made team shot. Everything about this mid 1920s snap is casual and this aspect makes for a more interesting image. The tall guy at left looks right away from the camera and stands in a manner you never usually see in rugby team portraits. The photographer has made no attempt to boss these guys into some symmetry to their pose and expression. Such freedom further emphasizes each man's personal individuality and indicates that this is probably a social team.

Snapshots - 11

Strangely, snapshots of sports are not as common as one would think they should be. Especially home-style team photos like this one. This shot of the rugby playing sailors coming from the HMS Dunedin was taken at Pearl Harbour in February 1929 while the ship was taking a Pacific voyage. The Dunedin was a Leander class light cruiser of the New Zealand division of the Royal Navy. It was launched in 1918 and later helped out with the after-effects of the Napier earthquake in 1931. In 1939, it went to the Atlantic ocean and was torpedoed there on 24 November 1941 with the loss of 419 lives.

I do not know yet which football field at Honolulu this team portrait was made at but it could have easily been the one which was actually very close to the dock area. Whoever T. A. was, he made sure to mark his place in this team. See how New Zealand's sailor guys of 1929 do not appear to have any Maori mates on their team. Today, the percentage of sailors who have Maori heritage is much larger.

*Please note that my talk is at 1pm this Sunday, not 3pm as previously stated.

On Sunday 7 June at 1pm I will talk about Snapshots - The Vernacular in New Zealand Photography in the Gallery's Art Lounge.

Detective work - Indian Script

Sometimes when I am researching a work I have to admit defeat and ask others for help, and that is what I'm doing now! In 2003 the Gallery acquired three Indian miniatures which are being restored in preparation for an exhibition after the Main Gallery building re-opens in 2011.

The back: While the subject matter of two have been easy to identify, I have been unable to find the exact meaning of the subject matter of this work, which we have tentatively called 'Attack on an elephant'. The work is painted in gouache, and there are two pieces of writing on the margins which may or may not help us identify the theme. There is also an inscription which says Of Hindu Music / Hamell Kanara Raqun 145. The red border indicates that this work was painted in India.

Writing at the top.

The dead white elephant in the foreground has had his trunk cut off, and the ends of his tusks are being presented to a man in the background by two warriors.

The elephant was an important symbol in Indian lore. One possibility is that the narrative relates to a tale in which Lord Buddha was incarnated as a white elephant only to have his tusks removed by a greedy forester. However, that tale doesn't mention the removal of the elephant's trunk, and the figures appear to be Mughal.

If you know anyone who can read this script and who could help us solve this mystery we would love to hear from you.