Harold Cazneaux Photographs - The Catalogue

Foreword

I first came across Harold Cazneaux about 20 years ago when I discovered The Home, that extraordinary magazine which survived from 1919 to 1942. Under the patronage of Sydney Ure Smith for most of its life its pages reverberate with an alluring mix of architecture, domestic interiors, decorative arts, gardens and society dames many illustrated with Cazneaux’s exquisite photographs. I expect The Home was many people’s introduction to his work.

With its interest in all things domestic it is little wonder that the Historic Houses Trust has not only acquired a full set of The Home but also taken an interest in Harold Cazneaux, including acquiring some of his photographs of Sydney houses.

In recent years the Trust has forged a very productive relationship with the National Library of Australia, exchanging exhibitions and working on several more together.

This is the first truly collaborative exhibition we have undertaken together. It draws on the knowledge and skills of both the Trust and the Library and on the significant collection of Cazneaux photographs held by the National Library. It has been a pleasure and privilege to work with Warren Horton, Director-General of the National Library of Australia and his staff on this important exhibition. We are both pleased it will travel to regional galleries in Waverley, Victoria and Newcastle, Dubbo and Orange in NSW.

Isn’t it ironic, in an age of multimedia extravaganzas, that Cazneaux’s uncoloured photographs, with their sheer beauty and ability to evoke a strong sense of place and to capture, not just a fleeting moment, but a whole atmosphere, have become more relevant than ever?

Peter Watts
Director, Historic Houses Trust of NSW


"You may agree with me in saying
that we have lived in perhaps the most
remarkable and inspiring period of
the history of photography

…That's worthwhile."

Harold Cazneaux, letter to Jack Cato, May 1952
NLA MS 5416
All letters from Cazneaux to Cato are from this collection

When Harold Cazneaux (1878-1953) died, photographic circles worldwide mourned his loss. Cazneaux was more than a photographer; he was a writer, critic and teacher of photographic theory and technique. He has left a legacy of photographic work that has proved timeless in its creative beauty and extraordinary tonal qualities.

Photography was part of Cazneaux’s world from childhood. Both his parents Pierce Mott (d. 1928) and Emma Florence Cazneau (d. 1892) worked in photographic studios in Wellington, New Zealand where Harold was born. The ‘x’ was added by Harold in 1904 to emphasize his French ancestry. When the family moved to Adelaide in 1889, Pierce Mott was employed at Hammer & Co.’s photography studio. It was at Hammer’s that Cazneaux entered the world of studio photography. Initially, he was not employed as a photographer, but as a colourist and retoucher. He showed no real enthusiasm for photography as it was practiced within the traditional studio system and spent his evenings attending classes at the Adelaide School of Design. He felt his real talent lay in sketching and drawing.

Then in 1898, the Australian photographer John Kauffmann (1864-1942) exhibited in an international photographic exhibition held in Adelaide. Kauffmann had spent the previous decade studying in Europe where he was swept up by a group of photographers calling themselves "pictorialists". He returned to Australia espousing their beliefs. The camera was an aesthetic instrument, they proclaimed, rather than a purely functional tool for recording images.

Every photograph was a work of art. The sharp focus so favoured by contemporary commercial studios was passed over for a softly focused "impressionistic" style. The resemblance to a painting or etching reflected a growing trend away from the realism of the nineteenth century.

The rapid advance in technologies associated with photographic processes was also linked to the pictorial movement that Kauffmann represented. Atmospheric carbon prints and particularly bromoil prints, where the final image is produced by an oil pigment brushed on to the surface, allowed a far greater degree of personal control. Bromoils were to become a Cazneaux trademark.

Kauffmann’s photographs were a revelation and proved to be an inspiration for Cazneaux:

"the instinctive urge was now fixed in my mind: henceforth my efforts would be towards using photography as a medium of artistic expression and away from the traditional business side of the professional studios."

Harold Cazneaux, letter to Jack Cato
NLA MS 5416

In 1904 Cazneaux moved to Sydney and began photographic work at Freeman & Co. An established studio with rooms in George Street, it was the epitome of the "fixed traditional business side of the professional studios". The economic hardships of the era dictated no other choice. Cazneaux soon bought his own camera, a Midge box quarter-plate. Fishing Off the Rocks, a striking action-filled outdoor photograph, was exhibited during that first year. Cazneaux’s dual career as a "pictorialist" and a traditional photographer had begun.

After arriving in Sydney, Cazneaux continued a romantic relationship that had begun in South Australia. While working at Hammer & Co. in Adelaide, Cazneaux had met Mabel Winifred Hodge (1882-1970). In 1905 she moved to Sydney and the two married; the partnership between them ending only with Cazneaux’s death in 1953.

The Cazneaux’s lived in Riley Street, North Sydney during the first years of their marriage. With Freeman Studios located in the city, a ferry ride and a walk from Circular Quay was part of Cazneaux’s daily routine. With his Midge box camera in his hand, Cazneaux discovered that the city streets were a rich source of subject matter. Cazneaux’s photographs from this period reflect his recognition of that visual diversity. Horse Ferry, Milson’s Point (1908) and Wharfies, Circular Quay, 1910 capture a moody phlegmatic city, while Razzle Dazzle (c.1909) is action-filled and spontaneous. Exhibited and illustrated widely, Razzle Dazzle received international acclaim and remains one of Cazneaux’s most evocative images.

Photography soon consumed Cazneaux’s life. It was more than his profession, it became his passion; but working at a conservative photographic studio like Freeman’s, while affording him financial security, required that this own creative needs were suppressed:

 

"The main output was the artificial make-up of stuffy overexposed figures against painted backgrounds and surrounded by fake furniture and what nots."

Harold Cazneaux, letter to Jack Cato
NLA MS 5416

As a consequence, a pattern of conflict emerged between his personal "pictorialist" aesthetic and the falsity of his work for Freeman’s that tormented him throughout the next decade.

Cazneaux joined the Photographic Society of New South Wales in 1907 and began exhibiting some of his work in their members’ exhibitions. Working furiously, he had amassed such a large body of quality work by 1908 that the Society encouraged him to exhibit on his own. Naturally Freeman Studios regarded "pictorial" photography as avant-garde, so Cazneaux had no choice but to develop and print his photographs at home. The family was fortunate to avoid poisoning from his photographic chemicals:

"About the year 1907, when my home at North Sydney became my work room I had to use sundry household articles - dishes, basins, bottles and jugs. I monopolised the dining room and table completely during the time when my pictures were being prepared for the one man show."

"Harold Cazneaux Replies", 1952
Annotated copy of a speech given at the time of a Tribute to Cazneaux by the Sydney Camera Circle and other phtotgraphic societies.
MS 5955

In 1909 Harold Cazneaux held the first solo photographic exhibition in Australia. Well received by the critics and public alike, it showcased seventy-six of Cazneaux’s pictorial photographs in a variety of photographic mediums. The Australasian Photo-Review’s critic was stunned by the vision of the thirty-one year old photographer:

"Where all the exhibits show such exceptional merit it is a little difficult to single any out for mention. We venture to prophecy that a good deal more will be heard of Mr Cazneaux in the future".

The Australasian Photo-Review, vol. XVI, no.3, 22 March 1909, p. 130

When these exhibition prints were hung in London exhibits in the following years, Cazneaux developed a formidable international reputation. Favourable reviews again followed. The international photographic journal Photograms of the Year, where Cazneaux himself was asked to become a regular contributor, published a review by critic H. Snowden Ward:

"In one stride Harold Cazneaux comes from the position of a very good man indeed to rank with the few outstanding workers of the world in pictorial photography. I place him with the dozen or more of the pioneers from whom one can expect anything of note".

H. Snowden Ward, Photograms of the Year, 1911, p. 54

Cazneaux’s exhibition proved to be important for another reason. It was here that he was introduced to publisher and art world leader Sydney Ure Smith. The resulting friendship, combined with Ure Smith’s immediate recognition of Cazneaux’s talent and his later patronage, had a marked impact on Cazneaux’s life:

"It was at this show that I first met Mr Sydney Ure Smith and other well known artists. They were very interested in the work and they accepted the fact that in the hands of the artist trained in the technique of photography, work of artistic merit could be produced".

Harold Cazneaux, letter to Jack Cato
NLA MS 5416

In the years following the 1909 exhibition, Cazneaux continued to consolidate his reputation as a pictorial photographer. As an Australian photographer who never travelled overseas, he admitted that he found his international reputation somewhat daunting:

" when I found that I had been recognised on such a level - my confidence was shaken. I never expected such a thing. Fortunately all those early pictures of mine were not flukes. I knew what I wanted and how to do them".

Harold Cazneaux, letter to Jack Cato, 6 March 1951
NLA MS 5416

Cazneaux and Winnie had become parents in 1908. They had five daughters; Rainbow, Jean, Beryl, Carmen, Joan and one son Harold. Throughout Cazneaux’s life, particularly during the conflict between the financial needs of his family and his own artistic desires, he was always able to rely on his family for personal support. Winnie proved to be his most important critic and his children were his best models. Their acceptance of the camera as part of everyday life enabled Cazneaux to experiment and expand the parameters of the photographic world. Rainy Day (1910) and The Quest (1910) are both portraits of his eldest daughter Rainbow.

In his later years, his children worked with him in the darkroom and studio; prompting Melbourne photographer Spencer Shier to call them "the Cazneaux family of photographers". In 1914 Kodak held a competition entitled "A Kodak Happy Moment". Cazneaux submitted an album of ten photographs and won first prize of one hundred pounds. The money enabled the family to finally make a deposit on a home in Roseville.

Ambleside as it was then known, was far removed from the familiar city streets where Cazneaux photographed. Set on three suburban blocks, the garden that the family designed and planted became a beguiling photographic backdrop. Ambleside had been bought from artist Gayfield Shaw and four years later, Cazneaux photographed Shaw. The resulting bromoil, The Etching Press (1918) is one of Cazneaux’s first hints at a new Australian style of photography.

Pictorial photography had spread amongst a small group of Sydney photographers. Until the mid 1910s they had been responding to a movement that dealt with an alien northern climate, landscape and light. But now they began to seek a new direction that would advance the art of pictorial photography within an Australian context. Cazneaux recognised the problems of the early movement.

"Australia had not yet clearly seen the true Australian sunlight - but there were a few workers who had seen the light and who were striving to establish a real Australian school of thought and action".
Harold Cazneaux, letter to Jack Cato, undated
NLA MS 5416

As a result of these deliberations, the Sydney Camera Circle "declaration" was drawn up and signed on 28th November 1916. The small group of six photographers included Cazneaux, Cecil Bostock, James Stening, W.S. White, Malcolm McKinnon and James Paton. He later noted:

" these photographers pledged to work and to advance pictorial photography and to show our own Australia in terms of sunlight rather than those of greyness and dismal shadows".

Harold Cazneaux, letter to Jack Cato, undated
NLA MS 5416

Although bounding forward with his personal work and the excitement of this new manifesto, Cazneaux was still shackled to the conservative traditional studio system with Freeman Studios. Supporting his large family left him no other financial alternative.

These pressures grew too great and in 1917, he suffered what the era called "a nervous breakdown". Bedridden for some months he realized that he could no longer function in the studio environment. His resignation from Freeman’s in 1917 was followed by the opening of his own studio. Initially located in the city with fellow pictorialist Cecil Bostock, an unforeseen redevelopment of the building forced him to relocate to Ambleside:

" lack of suitable premises and above all lack of capital sent me home again where I fitted out a little studio and carried out my professional work - I became so busy with appointments there was no time to look around for a city studio".

Harold Cazneaux, letter to Jack Cato, undated
NLA MS 5416

Although it was unusual at the time to work from home, Cazneaux was richly rewarded by the move to Ambleside. Profession and passion could now merge and Cazneaux’s business was soon doing a brisk trade. Although stylish portraits and wedding photos filled his "professional" working day, Cazneaux was free to explore light, shadow, texture and tones in his private moments. The Ambleside garden became an extension of his studio. Even his printed advertisements linked a natural, light-filled environment with photography:

"The charm of successful portraiture is realised when you are taken in the natural surroundings of your home and garden".

The Home, vol. 3, no. 2, 1 June 1922, p. 91

Sydney Ure Smith had been following Cazneaux’s career with interest since 1909. As editor (along with Bertram Stevens) of Art in Australia, Ure Smith had already begun to publish Cazneaux’s photographs.

In 1919, he decided to launch a new monthly magazine called The Home and Ure Smith invited Cazneaux to become official magazine photographer. The first issue of The Home featured Cazneaux’s light-filled portrait, The Bamboo Blind (1915), an image that exquisitely united his photographic and darkroom skills.

Cazneaux’s work for The Home was extensive and diverse. He photographed "at home" many of Sydney’s social elite, their gardens and their way of life. He photographed artists, models and actors as well as the city itself. Martin Place (1925) and Mail Time GPO (c.1932) depicts Sydney as a dynamic city enjoying that "long weekend" between the wars. While Cazneaux struggled with some of the society portrait commissions, he had now reached a period in his life where his artistic nature and paid photographic assignments were complementary. Cazneaux flourished in this new-found freedom.

One of the most successful portait series that Cazneaux photographed was commissioned by The Home. Called "New Idea" portraits, they combined painterly and photographic skills. Contemporary Australian artists such as Adrian Feint, Roy de Maistre and George Lambert painted the backdrops where The Home models were placed and photographed by Cazneaux. The series was particularly striking and cause much comment.

Cazneaux and Ure Smith’s professional relationship extended well beyond The Home magazine. With new co-editor Leon Gellert, Art in Australia thrived throughout the twenties and thirties. Many of their other special publications featured Cazneaux photographs, including the titles Sydney Surfing (1929), The Sydney Bridge Book (1930), The Australian Native Bear Book (1932) and Canberra: Australia’s Federal Capital (1928).

In 1934, Cazneaux was commissioned to take a series of photographs for a book depicting life at Frensham, a unique girls’ boarding school in Mittagong. Cazneaux, accompanied by Winnie, made several trips to the school. Welcomed by the staff and with no photographic restrictions, Cazneauz rejoiced in the freedom. The resulting photographs have a rare subtlety that capture the mood of this cloistered rural school. "The closest I ever came to a personal book" was how he later described the project.

The onset of the Depression in the Thirties saw business slow down in Cazneaux’s studio. Then in 1934-35, Cazneaux received one of his most interesting and challenging commissions. BHP wanted him to photograph their steelworks at Newcastle, New South Wales and Whyalla, South Australia. Photographing the human figure against an industrial landscape was not new to Cazneaux. His photograph Knock Off Time (1925) is a thoughtful interpretation of man and machine.

With this BHP commission, Cazneaux was relishing the prospect of photographing the ever-present smoke and steam to great effect. He was sorely disappointed:

"They had the vast area of the Newcastle steelworks cleared out from top to bottom. The whole works were then ready to be taken it was certainly spick and span but much of the element I had hoped for had vanished".

Harold Cazneaux, letter to Jack Cato, 9 March 1951
NLA MS 5416

Undaunted Cazneaux "made do" and the results are striking. They were precursors to a modernist style that was soon to overshadow pictorial photography with their bold composition yet delicate tonal qualities.

With a certain financial security during the mid to late thirties, Cazneaux began to explore the Australian landscape, travelling by car with Winnie and their son, Harold:

"They sent me in my Buik car up to Iron Knob near Port Augusta, SA. There I saw and felt the impulse of the great inland Central Australia. The mysterious Flinders Range dominated the skyline".

Harold Cazneaux, letter to Jack Cato, 9 March 1951
NLA MS 5416

A new world of photographic possibilities opened for Cazneaux. He was both a friend and admirer of the painter Hans Heysen, whom he had photographed in 1935. Heysen’s paintings were praised by some contemporary critics as quintessentially Australian; a reflection of a national character. Cazneaux, moved by the grandeur and beauty of the Australian landscape with its constantly changing light, wished to share the painter’s vision. The result, Spirit of Endurance (1937), a majestic Australian gum, photographed at Wilpena Pound in the Flinders Ranges, South Australia, became one of Cazneaux’s most enduring images. (The tree survives and is now referred to as "The Cazneaux Tree".)

In 1938 Cazneaux received the ultimate photographic accolate of his profession. He was made an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Photographic Society of Great Britain. For Cazneaux, an Australian photographer who had never been abroad, it was a triumphant and well-deserved international recognition.

The outbreak of World War II meant another slow-down in Cazneaux’s studio. His work for The Home magazine has been much reduced since 1934 when Fairfax and Sons Ltd. purchased Art in Australia Ltd. from Sydney Ure Smith and began to trivialise the content. The magazine finally ceased publication in 1942 under rationing pressure and falling sales. Cazneaux now turned his attention to portrait work, particularly of soldiers and their families:

"Those portraits meant a good deal to all those who were concerned and it was good to put all ones artistry and skill into such work".

Harold Cazneaux, letter to Jack Cato, 9 March 1951
NLA MS 5416

Then in 1941, the war disrupted family life at Ambleside and tragedy soon struck. The Cazneaux’s twenty-one year old son Harold was killed in the defence of Tobruk. Cazneaux was shattered; he never quite recovered from the loss.

Professionally Cazneaux realised he was being overtaken by new trends within the photographic world. Pictorial photographcy was being overshadowed by the extremes of Modernism and Cazneaux showed little or no interest. As a consequence although he continued his studio work, much of the last decade of his life, was spent rediscovering his own early work. Retiring gracefully, he made bromoils and added to his extensive collection of exhibition prints.

In the early 1950s, the photographer and historian Jack Cato had approached Cazneaux as part of his research for his book The Story of the Camera in Australia (1955). As a result, Cazneaux and Cato corresponded regularly. Their letters gave Cazneaux a rare means of reflection on his own life as a photographer and provided the modern researcher with important insights into Cazneaux’s aesthetic.

In 1952 Cato hosted a Harold Cazneaux tribute evening that had been organized by Keast Burke and Charles Walton. Magic lantern slides were accompanied by a recorded commentary between Cazneaux and photographer Monte Luke. The evening was a testament to Cazneaux as a great Australian photographer and toured the east coast of Australia. The following year Cazneaux died aged seventy-five:

"A machine camera age has arrived - the pictorial movement is no more. Hundreds are doing the same sort of thing in the same way. The quality and texture of the photographic print has vanished hundreds and hundreds of photographers produce prints which on the exhibition walls just become a one man show by everybody. Few workers can be spotted on the wall by individual works of character in subject and quality of print ... the romance and the spirit of the pictorial movement is no more, this is no lament, its the truth!"

Harold Cazneaux, letter to Jack Cato, 26 October 1951
NLA MS 5416

In hindsight, the end of the one photographic movement and the beginning of another have had no impact on the lasting originality of Harold Cazneaux’s photographic work.

I Sydney Skyline I Steam & Sunshine I Sydney, Old & New I
I
Spirit of Endurance I Frensham I The Home I
I
The Wheel of Youth I The Cazneaux Family of Photographers I

I The Catalogue I Exhibition Home Page I

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Last updated 16 December 2002