The Streets Of Sydney - Frank Plicka
HUW DAVIES GALLERY 13 August –30 August
Frank Plicka is one of a legion of photographers who have depicted the streets and people of Sydney.
Most of the earliest images were portraits of the wealthy and powerful, or images celebrating their property, leisure and business interests. These through the lenses of commissioned photographers skilled in the arcane science that was early photography.
Subject choices expanded when dry plate processes freed late nineteenth century photographers— professional and amateur— to walk the streets. And so the tradition of street photography began. Photographers began to tell stories of the rich and the poor, the beautiful and the grotesque, sometimes for payment but more often in the name of truth and a visual aesthetic.
Australia has a significant street photography tradition. In the case of Sydney, also embracing its beaches. Max Dupain’s iconic Sunbaker and other beach images assert a proud, heroic vision of Australia. David Moore, whose long and influential career began in Dupain’s studio, photographed migrants and working class people, including workers involved in some of Sydney’s great building projects. Jon Lewis (a 2009 PhotoAccess artist in residence) produced playful and sometimes self-mocking images of people on Bondi beach in the mid 1980s.
Unlike the higher profile photographers, Frank Plicka is a quiet observer. After 31 years in Australia, Plicka has had only a small number of exhibitions and very little financial reward for his work. But he is a patient, honest and empathetic observer of the human condition and a skilful darkroom printer.
Andrew Gash summed Frank Plicka up in his Foreword to Streets of Sydney (Brandl & Schlesinger, Sydney, 2001):
Frank’s work is even more remarkable in that it is not the career work of a professional photographer with all the benefits that this brings, but it is the work of one who is totally committed to his craft. Frank was often working two jobs, with limited time for his photography and has never been paid to take a photo. His passion for photography is the purest of passions.
Frank Plicka is represented in the collections of the State Library of NSW and the Museum of Sydney.
We are very pleased to present Frank Plicka’s fine black and white work in the HUW DAVIES GALLERY at the Manuka Arts Centre. Gilbert Herrada’s assistance has been invaluable.
David Chalker
