Too much history; too much black and white; too many old pictures lately…so I thought I’d post something I shot last week with my new walk-around camera, the Canon G11. This is the fire escape behind Kodak House in Hobart…still flaunting its bright corporate yellow though the company no longer occupies the building.
Fire escape, Hobart © Rob Walls 2009
Terence Stamp, 1967 © Rob Walls
In 1967, I was hired by UPI to shoot publicity stills for the John Schlesinger film of Thomas Hardy’s, Far From the Madding Crowd. Ten days of big budget movie promotion with Julie Christie, and Terence Stamp. A week of hard work and hard partying; dining on venison at Longleat with the Marquess of Bath, chartered trains to tour Hardy country, fine wines, unlimited Cuban cigars…and a brief to individually photograph a hundred invited journalists from all over the world, talking with the stars. Motor drives were just coming in but I had yet to afford one and shooting 30 rolls of Tri-X a day, I blistered my thumb on the milled wind lever of my Nikons.
Terence Stamp had just come back from filming a Western in Texas (Blue) for which he had had his hair bleached. In those days when grooming was considered an essential part of status, I couldn’t help think how scruffy he looked. He was just trend-setting. It would be a year or two before I adopted a more hippy style. And in hindsight, he just looks so damned cool! Still does…
Terence Stamp in interviews for "Far From the Madding Crowd", © Rob Walls1967
A clean-cut, clean shaven young man with Crown Graphic on the hill overlooking Koki Market in Port Moresby, 1964
Right back at the beginning of my career, I had what I like to think of as my “big break”. While it was a break for me, it was a far less welcome break for the other photojournalist involved.
In 1964, as a young, and very inexperienced photographer I was sent by the Australian Government to the Department of Information in Papua New Guinea to fill in for three months, while the local photographer took long service leave. This was an exciting assignment to get so early in my career. I had been working as an assistant photographer for just on a year and here I was, thrown in at the deep end, in nominal charge of a photo department, with several staff and a hell of a lot of responsibility…and to New Guinea; still a distant and exotic location.
Because it was the run-up to PNG’s first election prior to independence, I got to travel all over the country, covering the country’s first election campaign, flying in to all sorts of isolated airstrips in old DC3s and Cessnas. Even Time Magazine considered the story important enough to send a journalist and photographer, David Beal, from Sydney to cover the event. Getting to meet a professional Time photojournalist made a great impression one me. After all, it was my burning ambition to see my work published in magazines like this.
Encountering each other on the campaign trail, David and I shared a few beers but then we both headed off in different directions; he to the highlands, me to Rabaul in New Britain. In travelling the country, something that even today still has to be done mostly by plane, our paths crossed once again in transit at Lae airport. David was looking very sorry for himself; he was hobbling on crutches with both his legs in plaster from ankle to thigh.
While shooting with a long lens in the highlands, with the camera to his eye he had stepped out onto a narrow one-way bridge just in time to share it with. The impact broke both his legs and his Nikons sailed over the bridge and into the river below. The outcome of this unlucky accident was that my pictures ended up with the story in Time.
Time Magazine, February 28th 1964
I think iy was this particular tear-sheet that swung me a staff job on new national daily, The Australian, later that year.
But this is not the end of the story. David Beal went on to establish the biggest and best audio-visual company in Australia. When I wanted to produce an audio-visual portfolio piece on Indonesia, I decided to engage his company. When it was completed we launched the audio-visual with a little party at the AM studios. David was there for the showing and the drinks afterwards.
Late that night, he woke up to the clatter of rocks being thrown on the roof of his house in Paddington by some drunken louts. Racing out in his pyjamas to give them a verbal spray over the back fence, he leapt onto a garbage can. Losing his balance in the dark, he toppled off the can and broke his leg! For a few years after, David and I kept up a running joke that after meeting with me he had almost as many broken legs as we had had face-to-face meetings. I’m certain he made a deliberate policy of avoiding me after that so he could remain ambulatory.
Many years ago, on assignment in Java for Garuda Indonesian Airways, I went to photograph silversmiths at Tom’s Silver in Jogjakarta. I saw a craftsman applying his skills to an aluminum hard hat. It seems that oil-rig workers commissioned them and, amongst others, Tom”s Silver had made them for a couple of US Presidents and at least one Pope.
I just had to have one!
After paying my $US50, spelling out my name in pencil on the back of an envelope, specifying that the design should include a Nikon and some Australian elements, I left the silversmiths to do their work. A month later the hard-hat arrived in the mail. It was fantastic! An incredible photographic artefact.
There were Australian plants, a kangaroo and an emu, flowers and animals embossed all over the hat and a map of the continent on the back, in the most flamboyant array imagineable. Of course, I only ever gathered up the nerve to wear it to parties and then only when drunk. Too Village People!
But then one day looking at it on a shelf in the studio, I came up with this promotional still life with two Nikons, I called, Industrial Self-portrait….
For the amusement of my friends here’s a shot of me modelling my chapeau:
What every well-dressed industrial photographer should wear...
From Roy DeCarava’s book, The Sounds I Saw
It was 50 years ago that I first encountered the photography of Roy DeCarava. Addicted to jazz and hungering for information about my musical heroes, I used to devour the pages on the jazz monthly, Downbeat. DeCarava’s pictures in the pages of that authoritative magazine left an indelible impression at a time when, jazz and photography seemed to be two arts walking in step and doing so hand-in-hand.
It was the era of Bert Stern’s documentary, Jazz on a Summer’s Day (if anything the precursor to practically every music festival documentary that followed). It seemed to me the most natural thing that if you didn’t play an instrument but could use a camera that to attempt to capture the ephemeral music that was jazz on film, was an obligation.
For the life of me, I cannot remember which musician said this of which photographer, but I like to think that it was Dizzy Gillespie of Roy de Carava, who said, “That cat blows a mean camera”. Just as Gillespie’s music will resound for generations of musicians, so Roy DeCarava’s pictures will resound with me for the rest of my life. Roy DeCarava, more tha just a jazz photographer, died on Tuesday last (27th October). That cat really did blow a mean camera…
PS If anyone knows the source of that quote, I’d be delighted to be informed.
In 1964, as I left my first photography job as an assistant at the Australian News and Information Bureau in Canberra, to join the staff of the new national daily newspaper, The Australian, one of my former colleagues called out, “You’ll be back. That paper won’t last six months.” The Australian, of course is still going nearly 50 years later…so is my subject of this photograph…and so am I.
Back then, as a newcomer to newspapers in those hot-metal days, I was fascinated by everything about the process of getting out a daily. I was also fascinated by the kind of people that worked in this crazy world. One of these, a tall, lanky, quiet individual seemed to spend his days in a corner of the editorial floor, doodling with pens on large sheets of paper while drinking muddy looking instant coffee from an old jar. This I discovered, was the already legendary Bruce Petty, the doyen of Australian cartoonists.
Between assignments I would stand and watch fascinated as ideas flowed from his head, down his arm and through his pen, an instrument that rarely seemed to leave the surface of the paper. Yet, there it would be half an hour later, a fully formed incisive, funny comment on the news of the day. Even in the clatter and noise of a busy editorial section, Bruce seemed to be able to drink coffee, conduct a conversation in his slow, low, laid-back drawl and simultaneously produce his brilliant drawings. The reason he gave for drinking coffee from a jar was that he could always rely on it being there when he needed a drink, whereas coffee mugs had a tendency to “walk”.
A recent cartoon from Bruce's pen illustrating Australia's escape from recession.
In the years after we both left The Australian, we came across each other from time to time, at book launches and at galleries, but it had been some time since since our paths had crossed when The Good Weekend Magazine asked me to photograph him in 1989.
We met at his terrace house in Birchgrove, an inner city suburb of Sydney and after a bit of catching up and discussion, I settled on this little verandah alcove, where he stored his bicycle. I chose it for two reasons; firstly the window light was good, but even better was the eccentric arrangment of his bike hanging on the wall and the snaking line of the blind cord in the window. These accidental props were so like the style of his cartoons, Wildly bizarre bizarre mechanical arrangements and wandering lines that all connect in some way to make some kind of anarchic sense are a characteristic of Bruce’s unique style. It was only when I put him in front of the camera I realised that the juxtaposition of the bicycle wheel behind his head was a perfect prop to portray him as Saint Bruce, the patron saint of Australian cartooning; another of those serendipitous photo moments when all the elements seem to fall into place. Luck? Accident? Planning? Perhaps a bit of everything, mixed in with the ability to recognise and use a bit of blatant symbolism…
If you are interested in seeing more of Bruce’s recent work the following link will take you to a gallery at the Sydney Morning Herald: Bruce Petty Gallery
For those interested in technical matters, both the portraits of Bruce Petty and Michael Kirby were made with a Toyoview 5×4 studio camera and were shot on T-Max 400 with a Nikkor 150mm W lens.
Bruce Petty portrayed as the patron saint of Australian cartooning © Rob Walls 1989
Supreme Court Judge, Justice Michael Kirby
In 1988, Australia’s bicentennial year, along with several other photographers, I was commissioned by the Sydney Morning Herald’s Good Weekend magazine to work on a series of black and white photographs of notable Australians. From the list offered I chose two subject: cartoonist, Bruce Petty, and a man I had long admired for his dedication to human rights and a just society, the High Court Judge, Justice Michael Kirby.
While arranging that portrait session, I still recall my shock when his honour blandly suggested that a good time to take pictures of him would be at 5 a m…on a Saturday! Yes, he would be in his chambers catching up on work in the quiet hours of the morning as was his custom.
I was reminded of this long ago portrait session by the fact that this week I have been photographing a conference for the organisation Jobs Australia and the Honourable Michael Kirby AC CMG was one of the guest speakers. Last night it suddenly occurred to me that I should get him to sign a print. I went through my files and not only did I locate a print, but I found the actual one I had submitted to the Good Weekend…and still on the back was my original, dot-matrix printed caption.
Of the experience of photographing him, I find I had written:
“Saturday morning hangovers in Sydney’s Supreme Court building; mine Tequila, his Sancerre…sober as a judge?
During the hour our conversation ranges from happiness to Mrs Thatcher; love; Rembrandt; photography; especially Karsh of Ottawa; wine; and his mother who can no longer hold her head up in Kogarah now that her son has been named in some journalist’s list of the “100 Most Appalling People”…his tongue only ever leaves his cheek to float ideas that carry in their wake deep thoughts and a touch of the philosophical…
“Judging” the Polaroids…he turns the session into a collaboration.
His Honour, a civilised man, is probably in grave danger of giving the judiciary a good name…”
Twenty years on, this is how His Honour looked this morning while delivering an address titled “All you need is love…” to the Jobs Australia conference in Hobart.
Retired High Court Judge, Michael Kirby speaking at the Jobs Australia conference in Hobart, 23rd October, 2009.
He signed my print…and in recalling his passion for photography, unasked, he volunteered to launch an exhibition for me. “Life is a two-way street, Rob.” he said. I would be most honoured to have my work launched by a man of such warmth, wit and humanity. Expect to hear from me Michael, I have in mind just the project…
A second portrait of Michael Kirby from the shoot. I prefer the less sombre mood of this picture. © Rob Walls 1989
A triumphant Bob Hawke on the campaign trail in Sydney, 1983. This was shot on assignment for Newsweek. © Rob Walls
I’ve been photographing politicians in office and on the campaign trail since the time of Sir Robert Menzies. That was so long ago, I wore a suit and was still using a Speed Graphic. It would be three more years before I switched to more casual clothing and the ease and immediacy of the Nikon F.
While many photographers find political photography boring, I delight in the sport. And damned fine sport it is; working like a hunter, seeking that ephemeral split second, when the subject might inadvertently slip out from behind the polished public persona.
Photographing politicians needs the same finely tuned reflexes required for photographing sport. But I think it needs a much more highly developed recognition of “peak action” than is required in sports photography. The peak action of the political moment is far more subtle than the titanic, bone-crunching clash of footballers or the soaring leap of an athlete. Blink and you miss it…and unlike sports photography, the players don’t repetitiously try to re-create that moment. The reality of politics for the photographer is that there are teams of minders running interference between you and the subject trying to ensure that the moment is not repeated.
If you need convincing that our quarry is aware of the power of the unguarded political moment, you need look no further than the attempt by politicians to rule that the only legitimate subject to be photographed within the Australian Parliament was the politician speaking at the despatch box. All those SMSing, snoring, yawning or otherwise diverting themselves were ruled out of bounds. Of course the photographers of the press gallery ignored this.
These are some of my pictures of Australian Prime Ministers of the last few decades…
John Howard in opposition circa 1984, before his advisers smoothed the rough sartorial edges © Rob Walls
Paul Keating wth that particular twinkle in his eye, often displayed when taking delight in verbally skewering an opponent. © Rob Walls
Bob Hawke in vindictive mode. I always thought that underneath the smooth exterior lay one very good hater. © Rob Walls
Malcolm Fraser during the 1983 election campaign. When in power he was expert at maintaining the mask. Paul Keating once described him as "Like an Easter Island statue...with an arse full of razor blades". Out of office, he revealed a much warmer personality. Two weeks after this picture was taken, having lost the election, he actually wept on camera. ® Rob Walls
Irving Penn by Bert Stern
For those of us who came to professional photography in the early 1960s, the major influences were Henri Cartier Bresson, Robert Capa and Larry Burrows in photojournalism. But if you aspired to the path of photojournalism that included magazine illustration, then there was Bert Stern, Richard Avedon and Irving Penn. With all the humility I can muster, if ever I could claim a photographer influenced my work, it would be Irving Penn.
I don’t remember how I first became aware of his pictures. Maybe it was through the pages of the Swiss design magazine Graphis that I used to obsessively borrow from the graphic designers at the News and Information Bureau in Canberra. His influence on me and several generations of photographers has been profound.
Half of my photographic life has been spent pursuing the ephemeral craft of the photojournalist; the other half as an illustrative photographer; always with Penn’s cool style and unwavering aesthetic hovering over my work. He, (along with Edward Curtis and Frank Hurley) was the catalyst for my portraits for Polaroid in Papua New Guinea. It was from Penn that I borrowed the idea using a daylight studio. My portraits were an unashamed homage to his photography there.
He died in Manhattan on Wednesday last, aged 92. I believe he will continue to influence generations of future photographers…
PNG Portrait by Irving Penn
Food still-life by Irving Penn
Hells Angels by Irving Penn
Kate Moss by Irving Penn
Sophisticated lips for L'Oreal, 1968 by Irving Penn
Tasmanian Times