Very sadly the exhibition of my work “A Photographer’s Life – Part 3 – Portrait” on the walls of the gorgeous new Mulgrave Gallery on the Cairns Esplanade has now come to an end.
An epic opening eve back in late January followed by the six week run of the exhibition saw scores of viewers and fantastic feedback from visitors from around the planet and Australia (including many from the cruise ships that regularly dock in Cairns).
If you were one that couldn’t/didn’t visit the exhibition during it’s ‘showing’ but are still keen to see what it was all about … or just fancy your own tangible memento of the exhibition … you can still get your hands on your personally signed hard cover limited edition volume featuring all the portraits that were on the walls. The book “A Photographer’s Life – Part Three – Portrait” is now available via the ‘Shop’ on my web site at … https://www.briancasseyphotographer.com/shop/category/books/ … where you may also find my other Limited Edition signed books available. (HINT: If you are a Cairns ‘local’ or close by please just send me an email (bc@briancasseyphotographer.com) requesting your personalised copy and I’ll hand deliver it to you without any postage/shipping charges saving you $$$’s 🙂 )
Huge Thanks to curator Chris Stannard and the all the rest of the fabulous dedicated team at Cairns Galleries. To Head On Photo Festival director Moshe Rosenzveig OAM who flew from Sydney to open the exhibitions. Amazing ! Also to Collie Jacobs for the image (top) below of the gallery entrance with me spoiling the pic. Second image below is the cover of the book, followed by a couple of pics of the pages inside.
It was a brilliant and amazingly well attended evening.
Moshe Rosenzveig flew up from Sydney to perform the official exhibition openings under the evenings very threatening skies … and also joined me the following day hosting our artist/curators talks.
It is the first time that “Paper Tigers” has been shown outside of Sydney … and it was a real pleasure to see the sixty works by Australia’s wonderful photojournalist community on the expansive walls of the Court House Gallery … including my 2016 Nikon Walkley Portrait Prize winner “Abdullatif – Beaten Asylum Seeker” (pic 5 below 🙂 ). Was a real (lengthy and sometimes complicated) pleasure to work with Moshe to put this significant collection together. The exhibition includes many examples of Australian photojournalism that are historic and helped shaped the face of the country. VERY well worth a visit and a long long look.
My exhibition of ‘Portraits’ is a logical extension of my two earlier exhibitions … A Photographer’s Life Parts 1 & 2. Part One was exhibited in The Tanks Arts Centre in 2017 … and Part Two in the Court House Gallery in 2021. Together they documented not only my involvement in photography from a very early age and across the decades, but also the changes in photojournalism and the media environment. Part Three demonstrates the move more to portraiture from the more traditional and difficult to obtain (and more expensive) pure photojournalism. It also contains several of my fondest and most emotional images. Great to see some of the images projected the size of a house too !
“Word on the Street” is the product of my connections over the years with Trinity Bay High School and their visual arts students and teachers. I have judged and presented their annual photographic portrait prize for near a decade and have many times provided the students with class room talks and street walks where we explored photography and photojournalism. The catalyst for this particular exhibit was a chat with Cairns Galleries curator Chris Stannard (left in image 4). We mentored the students in photojournalism and encouraged them to produce work whilst charging young cadet journalist Isaac Colman with the task of writing their stories. A very rewarding and successful exercise …
Must, must … hugely thank Chris Stannard and all at the galleries staff (Andy, Narelle, Jilara, Laurence etc etc) who worked so hard to put these exhibitions together … Moshe for his time, expertise, words, camaraderie and attendance … the visual arts students and teachers from TBHS … my wonderful subjects (Vale Alf, George S, George C and Desley) … and all who taken the time out to be there on the opening eve or have subsequently walked through the gallery doors !
Also grateful to Charlie McKillop at ABC Radio who very nicely interviewed me on exhibition opening morning for her ‘Drive’ segment. You may listen to that interview here if you have ten minutes and forty seconds to spare.
I do hope to have some fascinating ‘360 degree’ videos of the exhibitions very soon.
In pics below … Mulgrave Gallery entry to “A Photographer’s Life – Part 3 – Portraits” and “Word on the Street” during an accompanying musical event – featuring my image “The Kids of Ali Curung” … my exhibit image “George at the Bus Stop” projected at dusk … some of my portraits on the walls of the Mulgrave Gallery … Cairns Galleries Chris Stannard at the Court House entry to “Paper Tigers” … my work :Abdullatif – Beaten Asylum Seeker” in the Court House Gallery “Paper Tigers” collection … projection of my work “Veronica – Where Home Brew Kills” late on opening evening … lastly, Head On’s Moshe Rosenzveig (right), myself (left – a VERY rare pic), friends from the Cairns photographic community Shaz Spannenburg, Peter Rossi, Charmaine Heyer, Polly Fenton with (rear) Robert Gray from Brisbane … at the Conservatory Bar ‘after launch’ ‘do.
