The Darling River
In 1886, Bayliss produced one of the most memorable photographic series of his career while working as the official photographer for the Lyne Royal Commission on Water Conservation. This had been set up by the Governor of New South Wales in 1884 to assess the situation along the Darling River, which had been suffering the crippling effects of drought. The irony was that the commissioners on the 1886 fact-finding expedition encountered extensive flooding of the Darling and Murray rivers.
The expedition set off from Bourke and travelled by paddle-steamer down the Darling, arriving at Wentworth three weeks later. The commissioners interviewed local residents along the way and assessed the condition of the land. Bayliss meanwhile took an extended series of photographs of the flooded Darling and surrounding landscape, and of the activities in what had rapidly become an important wool-growing area. Some of the events he photographed, such as the crossing of the Darling River by a huge mob of bullocks, were spontaneous occurrences, while others he constructed for the camera.
The project was ideally suited to Bayliss, uniting his interests in comprehensive documentation, the landscape and the mesmerising effects of water. His journey down the Darling offered a shift in vantage point that came from being on the river itself rather than on the land. But Bayliss’s series deals with the realities of rural life too: the harshness of the physical environment, and the sheer hard work involved in building new settlements and raising sheep and cattle.
Bayliss’s images were used to illustrate the official report, a selection of which was bound into presentation albums. Another member of the expedition team, Canadian writer Gilbert Parker (then with the Sydney Morning Herald) gave a literary account of what he saw, which was later published in his book Round the Compass in Australia (1892).
Darling River
Group of local Aboriginal people, Chowilla,
Lower Murray 1886
albumen print; 23.8 x 29.1 cm nla.pic-vn3968696
Wentworth on the Darling River 1886
albumen print; 21.3 x 28.7 cm nla.pic-vn3968492
Wool washing on
Gundabooka Station,
Darling River, 1886
albumen print;
22.4 x 29.0 cm nla.pic-vn3968100
Junction of Darling and Murray Rivers,
Taken from Victorian Side 1886
albumen print; 21.4 x 28.6 cm nla.pic-vn3426066
