There is so much to admire about this beautiful ambrotype recently acquired for Te Papa’s photography collection – look at the couple’s cheeks touched up by hand in pink, their jewellery and clothing. I also like that the couple are posed in front of the photographer’s studio interior wall fitted with a dado rail (centre behindRead more
Lissa Mitchell, Curator Historical Documentary Photography, looks at various views of Whanganui River’s famous ‘drop scene’. I want to share the journey of one image of Whanganui River taken by Dunedin photography studio and postcard publishers Muir & Moodie. This photograph has been reproduced in so many different versions thatRead more
The image above is my favourite from a WWI album with photos by NZ soldier Herbert (Bert) Green. The group seems just perfectly composed. There is also the sense of it being two photographs somehow layered together, with another scene unfolding quite independently behind the soldiers. The way the hat of theRead more
Can you spot the arrow in the sky? This photographic postcard, by photographer James Daroux, was sent by Herman Wollerman to his father in Wellington from the Takapau Divisional training camp in the Hawke’s Bay in May 1914. Lissa Mitchell, Curator Historical Documentary Photography, explains the story of this postcard.Read more
The novel The Luminaries is set in Hokitika in 1866 with most of the story taking place amongst a selection of businesses in Revell Street. The mystery is relayed, distorted and formed through different conservations and social interactions between the characters. However missing from the numerous businesses portrayed in the bookRead more
Gerald Gower (left) and Alfred Featherston Gower (right) are the two brothers who grace rather strikingly the cover of Berry Boys: Portraits of First World War Soldiers and Families by Michael Fitzgerald and Claire Regnault. The studio paraphernalia you see in the image above would have been cropped out inRead more
The Girl Peace Scout movement was developed in New Zealand by Lieutenant Colonel David Cossgrove and his wife Selina in 1908, in response to his daughter Muriel’s request for a scouting organisation for girls. Based in Christchurch, Cossgrove had been responsible for translating Robert Baden-Powell’s Scouting for Boys into aRead more
This week is Cook Islands language week 2014. The theme for the week is ‘Te Rakei o Toku Iti-Tangata’ – Our language and our culture are the foundation of who we are. Looking after cultural treasures is a significant part of Te Papa’s role in the community. We have aRead more
It is with sadness and regret that we learned that photographer Glenn Jowitt died suddenly on 22nd July. Glenn is best known for his photography of Pacific people and their cultures, both in New Zealand and in the Pacific Islands. Glenn was born in 1955 in Upper Hutt. He studied artRead more
I am quite fond of some of the new photographs in the collection which are a set of cabinet card format studio portraits from the late nineteenth century. Many of them were taken by photographers working in the South Island in places such as Lyttelton, Ashburton, Gore and Blenheim. I’mRead more
Last year to celebrate Cook Islands Māori Language week, Grace Hutton (Collection Manager Pacific Cultures) wrote a blog about photographer George Robson Crummer who resided in the Cook Islands from 1890. Te Papa has over 240 items from Crummer including 227 black and white negatives some of which are badlyRead more
Three hundred photographers (and two painters) have contributed images to the New Zealand Birds Online website, which was launched in June 2013. Each of the 461 bird species on the website has its own page, with one image selected as the ‘master’ image, and additional images presented as a galleryRead more
I don’t much like having my portrait taken. The longer the process goes on, and the more expectant I am of a good result, the worse it seems to get. So how much do you have to know about being photographed to get a good portrait? How many times do youRead more
![Copy of a portrait of two unidentified soldiers [inscribed Johnson]; 1914-1920; Berry & Co](https://i0.wp.com/blog.tepapa.govt.nz/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/Johnson.jpg?fit=406%2C550&ssl=1)
At Te Papa, photos of 30 unidentified World War soldiers are on display in The Berry Boys: Naming the Kiwi faces of War. These men had their photographs taken at the Berry & Co studio sometime during the war, but we no longer know who they are. The soldier subjectsRead more
Continuing our series of blogs to mark the visit of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge to New Zealand, I thought I would touch on one of the lesser known royal visits of the past, that of William’s grandfather, the Duke of Edinburgh, in December 1956. The relative obscurity ofRead more
