4wdtouring.com.au | 063CULTURETHE MOVEMENT
Modernism? It might sound like a bit of a toss, but
far from it, this is the 20th Century phenomenon that
changed the way us Aussies saw ourselves.
Modernism was all about reporting the transformation
that happened in the first half of the 20th Century. You
know, all those big picture things like industrialisation,
highways and manufacturing, things that changed the
landscape overnight.
And it did this with methods that hadn’t been used
before. Painters, architects and writers were inventing
new expressions for the new world, depicting the radical
changes in society with equally radical new styles.When it came to Modernist Photography, the new
methods revolved around using the camera as a tool
to document the reality of the changes, rather than a
fantasy. By doing this, the photographer could engage
with the changes head-on.
Fresh angles were discovered, not just of technology,
but also of the timeless outback. It was a new objec-
tivity that detached all emotion, to see things for what
they were,
It boomed when refugees arrived here, in a whole new
country where anything was possible. Most notable were
the young Germans, Helmut Newton and Wolfgang Sievers
who had both studied this ‘New Photography’ in Berlin.NATION
How the Australian landscape became ground zero for a
photographic movement.hey came from all over the world, steaming across the oceans on boats that entered Port
Philip Bay, with black-rimmed glasses, leather satchels and scarves.
They were mostly modernists, mostly WWII immigrants, and mostly from Berlin and London.
In Europe they had been hamstrung by very little change in light, and were forced to explore the
subtleties in shadow and texture from a European sun that didn’t shine as boldly and brutally.
The world was changing and this was a new country as far as old world art went. Artists no longer
had to follow all these rules of painting St. Sebastian for the 1000th time, nor of photographing the
same spring picnic scene on the Rhine. What if there was a new planet made just for photographers?
Where the old rules of art and photography were all thrown out the window.
When they arrived they joined forces with a vein of young Aussies who were already using these
newfangled cameras to document their own backyard with their own new techniques.
Enter the work of the Australian Modernists who showed us a country that was changing before
our eyes but, until now, not before our lens. This new photography was about the tactile, about
sense of self and your place in it. It was a map. You are here.
of light
T
JIMMY O’KEEFE