Baron Raimund von Stillfried
Austrian 1839-1911
worked throughout Europe and Asia 1871-1910
Blind shampooer (c.1875)
25.4 x 19.7cm (image and sheet)
Albumen silver photograph, colour dyes
Gerstl Bequest, 2000
Shashin
Nineteenth–century Japanese Studio Photography
8 February to 22 May 2005
NGV International
2 July to 28 August 2005
Latrobe Regional Gallery
13 January to 21 March 2006
Ballarat Fine Art Gallery
In the mid nineteenth century a distinctive style of photography developed in Japan. Shashin (Japanese for ‘photography’) features delicately hand-coloured photographs posed in the studio. The exhibition is the first in Australia to explore this remarkable period in photography where Western and Japanese photographers followed the conventions and subject matter of the famed ukiyo-e woodblock prints to show courtesans, actors and scenes of entertainment. It was a time when photography gave realism to genre studies while helping create stylised depictions of a traditional lifestyle that, in many cases, were becoming increasingly rare.
The beautiful 78-page catalogue of the exhibition is
available online or in person at the NGV Shop.
