The Australian Centre for Photography (ACP) is a

not-for-profit A nonprofit organization (NPO) or non-profit organisation, also known as a non-business entity, not-for-profit organization, or nonprofit institution, is a legal entity organized and operated for a collective, public or social benefit, in co ...

photography gallery in Darlinghurst,

Sydney Sydney ( ) is the capital city of the state of New South Wales, and the most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Sydney Harbour and extends about towards the Blue Mountain ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

that was established in 1973. ACP also provides part-time courses and community programs. It is one of the longest running contemporary art spaces in Australia. The Australian Centre for Photography has published ''Photofile,'' a biannual photography journal, since 1983. The ACP is a charity. Due to funding pressures during 2020, it ceased its activities from 16 December 2020 pending a restructure.

Function

The Australian Centre for Photography provided a photography gallery and also part-time courses and community programs. Amongst its initiatives were its hosting the Australian Video Festival; presenting public talks by such speakers as

Victor Burgin Victor Burgin (born 1941) is a British artist and writer. Burgin first came to attention as a conceptual artist in the late 1960s (Harrison & Wood, 1992; Walker, 2001) and at that time was most noted for being a political photographer of the le ...

; running an auction in support of Aboriginal protest against the

Australian Bicentenary The bicentenary of Australia was celebrated in 1988. It marked 200 years since the arrival of the First Fleet of British convict ships at Sydney in 1788. History The bicentennial year marked Captain Arthur Phillip's arrival with the 11 ships ...

; and administrating displays in Sydney streets and railway stations of posters by Barbara Kruger.Listing, ''The Sydney Morning Herald'', Friday 27 May 1988, p. 61

''Photofile''

Tamara Winikoff, director of ACP (1982-1985) began publication of ''Photofile,'' a small community newspaper in 1983 which became a significant journal showcasing Australian photography in a glossy, large format (44cm) and hosting the critiques and debates surrounding it. It was issued 3 times yearly from 1991. Editors included Mark Hinderaker, Mark Johnson, Ingeborg Tyssen & Tamara Winnikoff (with Robert Tuckwell for one issue) (1983); Mark Johnson (1984-85);

Geoffrey Batchen Geoffrey Batchen (born 21 November 1956, Melbourne, Australia) is an Australian art historian. Since 2020, Batchen has been Professor of Art History at the University of Oxford. Career Professor Assistant Professor, Visual Arts, University o ...

(1985-86); Catherine Chinnery (1987); Catherine Chinnery & Carole Hampshire (1987/88); Ross Gibson (Guest Editor, 1988);

Helen Grace Helen Grace (born 20 August 1971, in Hertfordshire) is an English actress. She played the incestuous Georgia Simpson on the Channel 4 soap ''Brookside''. Biography and Career Born Helen Victoria Scragg, she grew up as an only child in Northw ...

(Guest Editor, 1988);

Adrian Martin Adrian Martin (born 1959) is an Australian film and arts critic. He now lives in Malgrat de Mar in Spain. He is Adjunct Associate Professor in Film Culture and Theory at Monash University. His work has appeared in many magazines, journals and n ...

(Guest Editor, 1988); Robert Nery (1988-89); Elizabeth Gertsakis (Guest Editor, 1989); Fiona Macdonald (1990); Martin Thomas (1991-93); Jo Holder (1993-94); George Alexander (1995-97); Jacqueline Millner & Annemarie Jonson (Guest Editors, 1996); Bruce James (1997-99); Blair French (Managing Editor 1998-9);Francisco Fisher (Guest Editor 2000). Without capital to increase circulation to attract more advertising for its funding, its survival in the 1990s was threatened. Alasdair Foster as director (1998-2011) secured increased financial support, enabling its print run to be increased and for the first time the magazine was distributed nation-wide through newsagents. From 2010 ''Photofile'' was issued as a digital-only publication until Kon Gouriotis began as Director in early 2012 and a print version was relaunched in March 2013. The journal was again relaunched in 2017 under the new editorship of Daniel Boetker-Smith. An anthology of essays from ''Photofile'' was published in 1999 as ''Photo files : an Australian photography reader'' edited by Blair French, with a preface by

Gael Newton Gael Newton BFA is an Australian art historian and curator specializing in surveys and studies of photography across the Asia-Pacific region. Newton was formerly the Senior Curator of Australian and International Photography at the National Galle ...

, then Senior Curator of Photography at the Australian National Gallery.

History

On 23 April 1970, leading Australian photographer,

David Moore David Moore may refer to: Politics * David E. Moore (1798-1875), American politician in Virginia * David Moore (Australian politician) (1824–1898), politician in Sandridge, Victoria, Australia * David Moore (Manx politician), member of the H ...

wrote a letter to Wesley Stacey, Grant Mudford and

David Beal David Beal (born 17 July 1966) played first-class and List A cricket for Somerset County Cricket Club in the 1991 season. He was born at Butleigh, Somerset. Beal was a lower-order right-handed batsman and a right-arm medium-pace bowler who to ...

. In it he asked them to discuss with him the idea of a non-profit, national centre for photography to research, exhibit, publish, collect and advance photography. To examine the situation of photography in Australia he led a committee of other practising photographers Wesley Stacey,

Laurence Le Guay Laurence Craddock Le Guay (25 December 1916 – 2 February 1990), was an Australian fashion photographer. Biography Laurence Craddock Le Guay was born on 25 December 1916 at Chatswood, New South Wales, Chatswood Sydney, of locally born parents ...

, senior curator of the

Art Gallery of NSW The Art Gallery of New South Wales (AGNSW), founded as the New South Wales Academy of Art in 1872 and known as the National Art Gallery of New South Wales between 1883 and 1958, is located in The Domain, Sydney, Australia. It is the most importa ...

and ''

Sydney Morning Herald ''The Sydney Morning Herald'' (''SMH'') is a daily compact newspaper published in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, and owned by Nine. Founded in 1831 as the ''Sydney Herald'', the ''Herald'' is the oldest continuously published newspaper i ...

'' art critic, Daniel Thomas. and the director of an architectural and planning firm, Peter Keys, with support from arts commentator

Craig McGregor Craig Rob Roy McGregor (12 October 1933 – 22 January 2022) was an Australian journalist, essayist, academic, cultural observer and critic. Life and career McGregor grew up in Jamberoo and then Gundagai in New South Wales, before his family mo ...

. In July 1973, the Visual Arts Board accepted that there was a need for such a body in Australia and part-funded their proposal to set up a permanent photographic gallery in Sydney.

Venues

Margaret Whitlam Margaret Elaine Whitlam, AO (née Dovey; 19 November 1919 – 17 March 2012) was an Australian social campaigner, author, and athlete. She was the wife of Gough Whitlam, the 21st Prime Minister of Australia from 1972 to 1975, and a representat ...

opened the first ACP gallery in a corner terrace refurbished by architect Michael Standley at 76a Paddington Street, Sydney, on 21 November 1974 with the initial exhibition ''Aspects of Australian Photography.'' The organisation subsequently changed the location of its gallery and offices several times. Christine Godden as director oversaw the moving of the Centre in 1981 to Dobell House at 257 Oxford Street,

Paddington Paddington is an area within the City of Westminster, in Central London. First a medieval parish then a metropolitan borough, it was integrated with Westminster and Greater London in 1965. Three important landmarks of the district are Paddi ...

but in 1989, subsequent director Denise Robertson, previously of Melbourne University Union's George Paton Gallery, finding the Centre suffering from a deficit and a declining public profile, foreshadowed another relocation due to Paddington becoming "too expensive". It shared space with the Sydney Dance Company theatre at Pier 4/5 refurbished at a cost of $16 million to create a venue "second only to the Sydney Opera House", as announced by the Ministry for the Arts in May 1991. Under the directorship of Deborah Ely the Oxford Street premises were upgraded after mediation by NSW Ministry for the Arts persuaded the building's vendor the Dobell Foundation to waive $750,000 of the mortgage, and through an arrangement negotiated protractedly over 1993-4 variously with entrepreneur

Rene Rivkin Rene Walter Rivkin (6 June 1944 – 1 May 2005) was a Chinese-born Australian entrepreneur, investor, investment adviser, and stockbroker. He was convicted of insider trading in 2003 and sentenced to nine months of periodic detention. Early li ...

with caterer Maggi Agostini, then Victoria Alexander and others, to lease a café/restaurant in the shopfront, with the ACP offices and gallery behind. A temporary closure in September 1993 saw refurbishments begin, with further assistance from the Ministry of $50,000 and also its loan of $300,000. In the interim the gallery opened at 27-31 Abercrombie St., Chippendale (6km closer to the CBD and now housing Galerie pompom) under the name Temporary Hoarding to continue with a few shows into November 1994, including ''Reflex'' (12-27 August), sustained by curator/publicist Susan Charlton organising brochures and "Sydney Artbus" public tours. It was not until March 1996 that NSW Premier Bob Carr reopened the Centre, and its café (ultimately named ''La Mensa''). From 2011, as photography students increasing turned to courses in tertiary institutions for instruction, revenue from the ACP's film-based workshops continued to fall, and in 2015, the Centre was forced to sell its building."Australian Centre for Photography closes", ''ProPhoto'', Vol. 77-1, Issue 230, January 2021, p.13 It rented accommodation at 72 Oxford Street, Darlinghurst, Sydney. Its current location is at 21 Foley St, Darlinghurst, a kilometre west along Oxford Street from number 72, and closer to the CBD.

Directors

Graham Howe Graham Howe (born 1950) is a curator, writer, photo-historian, artist, and founder and CEO of Curatorial, Inc., a museum services organization supporting nonprofit traveling exhibitions.ArticleDouble Exposure. December 1, 2007. Accessed August 2 ...

1974–5 * Bronwyn Thomas 1975–1977 *

(Acting) October 1977–February 1978 * Christine Godden 1978-1982 * Tamara Winikoff 1982–1985 * Lawrence Bendle (Acting) 1985 * Denise Robinson 1986–1992 * Deborah Ely 1992–1997 * Alasdair Foster 1998–2011 * Kon Gouriotis 2012–2015 * Catherine Baldwin (Acting) 2015-2017 * Cherie McNair 2017-2019 * Pierre Arpin 2019-

2020 temporary closure

On 19 November 2020 the Australian Centre for Photography, announced it would go into a 'hibernation' from 16 December "due to a cash crunch brought on by COVID-19 lockdown, the shift to smartphone photography and funding cuts.". A restructure of the organisation would protect it from "ongoing financial losses"; ACP Chairman, Michael Blomfield said: "our organisation will not receive any operational funding from federal or state funding bodies for the next three years as a minimum, it is clear that continuing to operate in our current form is a pathway to extinction." Co-incident with the closure of the ACP, planning was taking place for a

National Centre for Photography The National Centre for Photography, sited in the regional city of Ballarat in Victoria, Australia exhibits, promotes, archives, and provides education, in photography. History Foundation The business name, National Centre for Photography, ...

, with galleries, library, darkroom, an archive and education program, to be opened in regional Ballarat, funded with $6.7 million from the Victorian state government. The city is home to the

Ballarat International Foto Biennale The Ballarat International Foto Biennale Inc (BIFB) is a not-for-profit organisation. Held every two years, the Ballarat International Foto Biennale is a 60-day festival in Ballarat in regional Victoria, Australia. that delivers a program of two m ...

which has been running since 2005.

Initiatives

The ACP produced the first major retrospectives of

Max Dupain Maxwell Spencer Dupain AC OBE (22 April 191127 July 1992) was an Australian modernist photographer. Early life Dupain received his first camera as a gift in 1924, spurring his interest in photography. He later joined the Photographic Society ...

Olive Cotton Olive Cotton (11 July 191127 September 2003) was a pioneering Australian modernist photographer of the 1930s and 1940s working in Sydney. Cotton became a national "name" with a retrospective and touring exhibition 50 years later in 1985. A book ...

and

Mervyn Bishop Mervyn Bishop (born July 1945) is an Australian news and documentary photographer. Joining ''The Sydney Morning Herald'' as a cadet in 1962 he was the first Aboriginal Australian to work on a metropolitan daily newspaper and one of the first to b ...

. An early opportunity for photographers initiated by the ACP in 1978 was the Colonial Sugar Refinery Project, a commission for six Australian practitioners, Micky Allan, Sandra Edwards, Mark Johnson, Graham McCarter,

Lewis Morley Lewis Frederick Morley (16 June 1925 – 3 September 2013) was a photographer. Biography Morley was born in Hong Kong to English and Chinese parents and interned in Stanley Internment Camp during the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong between 1941 ...

and Jon Rhodes, to freely make artistic and documentary work relating to the CSR site at Pyrmont. After its successful exhibition and publication the project was extended into the 1980s and inspired other art-based, non-commercial collaborations with industry. ''Signature Works - 25th Anniversary Exhibition'', in 1999 included works by Fiona Hall, Bill Henson,

Carol Jerrems Carol Jerrems (14 March 1949 – 21 February 1980) was an Australian photographer/filmmaker whose work emerged just as her medium was beginning to regain the acceptance as an art form that it had in the Pictorial era, and in which she newly sy ...

, Maria Kozic, Tracey Moffatt, Max Pam,

Patricia Piccinini Patricia Piccinini (born 1965 in Freetown, Sierra Leone) is an Australian artist who works in a variety of media, including painting, video, sound, installation, digital prints, and sculpture. Her works focus on "unexpected consequences", conv ...

, Jon Rhodes, Michael Riley, and Anne Zahalka selected by 25 Australian photographic curators, writers, artists and academics, and was a contemporary survey indicative of the national reach of the Centre.

Exhibitions

References

External links

*
Resources for Australian Centre for Photography
at

National Library of Australia The National Library of Australia (NLA), formerly the Commonwealth National Library and Commonwealth Parliament Library, is the largest reference library in Australia, responsible under the terms of the ''National Library Act 1960'' for "mainta ...

{{authority control 1973 establishments in Australia Art galleries established in 1973 Art museums and galleries in New South Wales Photography museums and galleries in Australia Photography magazines