Sir Warwick Fairfax circa 1980 © Rob Walls
He was imperiously intimidating. “What’s your brief son? What were you told to shoot? Who are you working for? This is just not good enough! I want to be photographed here; in front of the portrait of the old man!”. I didn’t argue. This portrait of Sir Warwick Fairfax is from a shoot for a John Fairfax Limited annual report sometime around 1980. I got the distinct impression he was disappointed that he couldn’t fire me, because I wasn’t a Fairfax staffer…
Tasmanian Times
This photographer's life 
Formal portraits can be so tedious and less than honest. I love this visually and from your description the knuckles are a clincher. And it’s done on film! Brill x
Thanks Chris and Dave…the secret in taking this kind of picture is not so much in the photography as in not being intimidated by those who feel it necessary to exercise their supposed power. If you keep your nerve, what you want to say about them inevitably comes across in the picture. I know it’s bad manners to talk ill of the dead, but Sir W. came across as a pseudo-aristocratic Presbyterian, prig.
That’s an awful thing to say. How dare you call him “pseudo”.
I’ll withdraw that Chris…and substitute, “ersatz”:-)
Yes, love the knuckles.
Love the daggers staring into your lens Rob!
Looking back, Paul, just can’t imagine any other expression from him. Not a visage from which you could expect to extract a smile:-)