Note: Joan Blundell was one of Cazneaux’s five daughters.

The collection of Kerry Dundas;
Private collection, Sydney

In 1972 he was appointed photographer at the Art
Gallery of New South Wales. Throughout the course of
his career hewas afforded the opportunity tophotograph
many contemporary artists from the second half of the
20th century; this vintage image of artist Brett Whiteley
shows the iconic Australian artist alongside one of his
major abstractions from the early 1960s.

Kerry Dundas, son of artist Douglas Dundas, gained an interest in photography as a student at Sydney Grammar. After leaving school he worked for various studios, including Max Dupain’s in the 1950s. In the 1960s Dundas worked in the UK as a photojournalist, drawn to subjects of social upheaval such as the Notting Hill Gate riots.

He returned to Sydney in 1967, and published a book of photographs of New Guinea subjects in 1969. In 1972 he was appointed photographer at the Art Gallery of New South Wales. Throughout the course of his career he was afforded the opportunity to photograph many contemporary artists from the second half of the 20th century.

This historic photo shows the the Cahill Expressway only a handful of years after its completion in 1958. This photograph was taken before the construction of the now demolished Goldfield’s house. This landmark building would later be erected to the far right and was completed in 1966. Note also the AMP building on the far left which was finished in 1962. It is from this history of Sydney’s harbour skyline that we know this image was taken between 1962 and 1966; an intriguing glimpse into the city’s architectural past.

The photograph illustrated on the previous page Manly  [Surf Boat from Shark Tower] was taken from the top of this soaring look-out point. The Shark Tower was demolished in subsequent years.

Stamp verso reads “Max Dupain & Associates Pty Ltd, Unit 13, Valetta Building, Campbell Street, Artarmon, 2064, Australia.”

Another example is held in AGNSW with date ‘1940’ and comment “Dupain said of his day at Manly beach “actions like this have to be anticipated; in this case by me standing out in the surf with camera and waiting for the start. One shot only —I had to be lucky and I was” (Dupain 1986).

This image, along with The Sunbaker (1937), Bondi (1939) and At Newport (1952) is one of Dupain’s most famous and revered images.

The model for this photograph was Olive Cotton, Dupain’s first wife. Ref:
Sally McInerney, Cotton’s daughter.

The David Moore estate

“David Moore was Australia’s most renowned and widely travelled documentary photographer. He began working as a photographer in 1947 in the commercial advertising studio of Russell Roberts. Between 1948 and 1951 he assisted Max Dupain, and began to develop his own approach to the documentary style, walking the streets of depressed inner-city suburbs of Sydney taking still photographs. Moore’s ‘Redfern interior’ 1949 was included in Edward Steichen’s ‘Family of Man’ exhibition, which toured internationally from 1955. Moore was one of two Australians to be included in the exhibition. In 1951 Moore turned down the offer of partnership with Dupain and moved to London to work for international picture magazines including the Observer, the New York Times, Time-Life, Look, and Sports Illustrated. From 1958 he travelled the world for the New York agency, Black Star, working for Time-Life books, National Geographic and corporate and industrial clients. His international assignments took him to Asia, America, Antarctica and Africa until the 1980s. Moore’s photographs are held in Australian and international collections including the Museum of Modern Art, New York; Bibliothèque Nationale de France, Paris, and the Smithsonian, Washington, DC.”

Excerpt taken from the Art Gallery of New South Wales website.

The David Moore estate

This exceptionally rare small proof image is one of only a few vintage prints created by David Moore before the negative was damaged. No further were made. One notes a variation in this image when compared to that which is illustrated opposite. It is taken probably within moments of the more recongisable work which does not contain the motor bike rider in the foreground.

Caption reads “Early morning traffic on the Sydney Bridge.” Another example held in AGNSW.

This image was taken from the mast of a ship on Sydney Harbour. Vaniman had intended that his panoramas be exhibited in public buildings as massive enlargements, but today they survive as extremely rare and detailed platinum contact prints. He spent over a year photographing Australia and New Zealand on behalf of the Oceanic Steamship Company creating promotional images for the company.

Beginning in 1903, Vaniman spent over a year photographing Sydney and the surrounding areas. It was during this time that he created his best known work, the panorama of Sydney, shot from a hot air balloon he had specially imported from the United States. Vaniman is best known for his images of Hawaii, Australia, and New Zealand.

The collection of the artist

This work was produced during a six month residency at the Bondi Pavilion Community Centre in 1989 and a number of works were acquired by the Art Gallery of New South Wales for the exhibition Twenty Australian Photographers at the National Gallery of Victoria, 1990 and a substantial number from this series were later included in a major exhibition The Beach at the Museum of Heide in 1994.

This series challenges some of the dominant representations of the beach through a series of photographic portraits taken against a painted backdrop of Bondi and explores the cultural stereotypes that usually define its visual history and parody these in an ironic and critical manner.