Australian Centre for Photography

About

The Australian Centre for Photography (ACP) was a not-for-profit photography gallery in Darlinghurst, Sydney, Australia that was established in 1973 and which also provided part-time courses and community programs. One of the longest running contemporary art spaces in Australia, after a shutdown from 16 December 2020 pending a restructure, it was acquired in October 2022 by the Museum of Applied Arts & Sciences and relaunched as Powerhouse Photography. Powerhouse will continue and expand on ACP programs with commissions, acquisitions, publications, learning and research activities dedicated to the promotion and development of photography in Australia. The Australian Centre for Photography published Photofile, a biannual photography journal, from 1983.

The Australian Centre for Photography provided a photography gallery and also part-time courses and community programs. Amongst its initiatives were its hosting the Australian Video Festival; presenting public talks by such speakers as Victor Burgin ; running an auction in support of Aboriginal protest against the Australian Bicentenary ; and administrating displays in Sydney streets and railway stations of posters by Barbara Kruger.

Tamara Winikoff, director of ACP (1982–1985) began publication of Photofile, a small community newspaper in 1983 which became a significant journal showcasing Australian photography in a glossy, large format (44cm) and hosting the critiques and debates surrounding it. It was issued 3 times yearly from 1991.

Editors included Mark Hinderaker, Mark Johnson, Ingeborg Tyssen & Tamara Winnikoff (with Robert Tuckwell for one issue) (1983); Mark Johnson (1984–85); Geoffrey Batchen (1985–86); Catherine Chinnery (1987); Catherine Chinnery & Carole Hampshire (1987/88); Ross Gibson (Guest Editor, 1988); Helen Grace (Guest Editor, 1988); Adrian Martin (Guest Editor, 1988); Robert Nery (1988–89); Elizabeth Gertsakis (Guest Editor, 1989); Fiona Macdonald (1990); Martin Thomas (1991–93); Jo Holder (1993–94); George Alexander (1995–97); Jacqueline Millner & Annemarie Jonson (Guest Editors, 1996); Bruce James (1997–99); Blair French (Managing Editor 1998–9); Francisco Fisher (Guest Editor 2000).

Without capital to increase circulation to attract more advertising for its funding, its survival in the 1990s was threatened. Alasdair Foster as director (1998–2011) secured increased financial support, enabling its print run to be increased and for the first time the magazine was distributed nation-wide through newsagents.

From 2010 Photofile was issued as a digital-only publication until Kon Gouriotis began as Director in early 2012 and a print version was relaunched in March 2013. The journal was again relaunched in 2017 under the new editorship of Daniel Boetker-Smith.

An anthology of essays from Photofile was published in 1999 as Photo files: an Australian photography reader edited by Blair French, with a preface by Gael Newton, then Senior Curator of Photography at the Australian National Gallery.

On 23 April 1970, leading Australian photographer, David Moore wrote a letter to Wesley Stacey, Grant Mudford and David Beal. In it he asked them to discuss with him the idea of a non-profit, national centre for photography to research, exhibit, publish, collect and advance photography. To examine the situation of photography in Australia he led a committee of other practising photographers Wesley Stacey, Laurence Le Guay, senior curator of the Art Gallery of NSW and Sydney Morning Herald art critic Daniel Thomas, and the director of an architectural and planning firm, Peter Keys, with support from arts commentator Craig McGregor. In July 1973, the Visual Arts Board accepted that there was a need for such a body in Australia and part-funded their proposal to set up a permanent photographic gallery in Sydney.

Margaret Whitlam opened the first ACP gallery in a corner terrace refurbished by architect Michael Standley at 76a Paddington Street, Sydney, on 21 November 1974 with the initial exhibition Aspects of Australian Photography under inaugural director Graham Howe. That exhibition, expanded with ten more photographers' work to comprise Godwin Bradbeer, Warren Breninger, John Cato, Ian Dodd, Max Dupain, Rennie Ellis, Richard Harris, David Moore, Grant Mudford, Jon Rhodes, Roger Scott, Wesley Stacey, John Walsh and Richard Woldendorp, but with Max Pam who was in the original line-up, being excluded, as noted by Palmer, due to perceived sensitivities about his explicit imagery made in SE Asia, toured to Australian embassies and high commissions in Malaysia, the Philippines, Indonesia, Singapore, Thailand, Japan, Burma, India, Sri Lanka and South Africa (given the end of apartheid ) in 1975 and 1976, supported by the Department of Foreign Affairs. Women photographers were not included the initial exhibition of Aspects, nor its touring version, despite the added participants, prompting Deborah Ely, a later director of ACP to comment;

It is a characteristic of the early years of the ACP that its governing culture was exceptionally male... "debate" between the founding fathers of ACP and feminists grew up over the years and persisted into the 1980s.

The organisation subsequently changed the location of its gallery and offices several times. Christine Godden as director oversaw the moving of the Centre in 1981 to Dobell House at 257 Oxford Street, Paddington but in 1989, subsequent director Denise Robertson, previously of Melbourne University Union's George Paton Gallery, finding the Centre suffering from a deficit and a declining public profile, foreshadowed another relocation due to Paddington becoming "too expensive". It shared space with the Sydney Dance Company theatre at Pier 4/5 refurbished at a cost of $16 million to create a venue "second only to the Sydney Opera House", as announced by the Ministry for the Arts in May 1991.

Director Deborah Ely resisted, later saying; "when I joined ACP four years ago we were committed to a relocation at Pier 4/5. It seemed a real pity given this fantastic location and the fact that we'd been in Paddington for 20 years. I thought we should stay and make the most of the existing site." Accordingly, the Oxford Street premises were upgraded after mediation by NSW Ministry for the Arts persuaded the building's vendor the Dobell Foundation, which, with the help of Premier Neville Wran, had purchased the site from the NSW Fire Brigade for $1.5 million, mortgaged it to ACP for $750,000 a 50 рег cent discount, which Ely expected to pay off within 10 years. Its reopening increased the growing number of photography galleries in Sydney with the Byron Mapp Gallery, also in Oxford Street, Stills Gallery in Elizabeth St., the Josef Lebovic Gallery in Paddington Street and, from 15 February 1996, Toast II in Commonwealth Street. Architect James Grose refurbished the ACP by opening the facade up to the street and adding a two-storey extension with a central staircase in a construction by John Lewis and Luigi Rosselli, which integrated galleries, library, darkrooms, studio, digital imaging facilities, specialist bookstall and a restaurant, the latter through an arrangement negotiated protractedly over 1993–1994 variously with entrepreneur Rene Rivkin with caterer Maggi Agostini, then Victoria Alexander and others, to lease the shopfront, with the ACP offices and gallery behind.

A temporary closure in September 1993 saw refurbishments begin, with further assistance from the Ministry of $50,000 and also its loan of $300,000. In the interim the gallery opened at 27–31 Abercrombie St., Chippendale (6 km closer to the CBD and now housing Galerie pompom) under the name Temporary Hoarding to continue with a few shows into November 1994, including Reflex (12–27 August), sustained by curator/publicist Susan Charlton organising brochures and "Sydney Artbus" public tours. It was not until March 1996 that NSW Premier Bob Carr reopened the centre and launched its first show since December 1994, Inheritance, and its café, which was ultimately a joint venture between Stefano Manfredi of Restaurant Manfredi and Barry McDonald (B & J Lizard produce) and named La Mensa.

From 2011, as photography students increasing turned to courses in tertiary institutions for instruction, revenue from the ACP's film-based workshops continued to fall, and in 2015, the centre was forced to sell its building. It rented accommodation at 72 Oxford Street, Darlinghurst, Sydney. Its current location is at 21 Foley St, Darlinghurst, a kilometre west along Oxford Street from number 72, and closer to the CBD.

- Laurence Le Guay (Acting) October 1977 – February 1978

Margaret Whitlam opened the first ACP gallery in a corner terrace refurbished by architect Michael Standley at 76a Paddington Street, Sydney, on 21 November 1974 with the initial exhibition Aspects of Australian Photography under inaugural director Graham Howe. That exhibition, expanded with ten more photographers' work to comprise Godwin Bradbeer, Warren Breninger, John Cato, Ian Dodd, Max Dupain, Rennie Ellis, Richard Harris, David Moore, Grant Mudford, Jon Rhodes, Roger Scott, Wesley Stacey, John Walsh and Richard Woldendorp, but with Max Pam who was in the original line-up, being excluded, as noted by Palmer, due to perceived sensitivities about his explicit imagery made in SE Asia, toured to Australian embassies and high commissions in Malaysia, the Philippines, Indonesia, Singapore, Thailand, Japan, Burma, India, Sri Lanka and South Africa (given the end of apartheid ) in 1975 and 1976, supported by the Department of Foreign Affairs. Women photographers were not included the initial exhibition of Aspects, nor its touring version, despite the added participants, prompting Deborah Ely, a later director of ACP to comment;

It is a characteristic of the early years of the ACP that its governing culture was exceptionally male... "debate" between the founding fathers of ACP and feminists grew up over the years and persisted into the 1980s.

The organisation subsequently changed the location of its gallery and offices several times. Christine Godden as director oversaw the moving of the Centre in 1981 to Dobell House at 257 Oxford Street, Paddington but in 1989, subsequent director Denise Robertson, previously of Melbourne University Union's George Paton Gallery, finding the Centre suffering from a deficit and a declining public profile, foreshadowed another relocation due to Paddington becoming "too expensive". It shared space with the Sydney Dance Company theatre at Pier 4/5 refurbished at a cost of $16 million to create a venue "second only to the Sydney Opera House", as announced by the Ministry for the Arts in May 1991.

Director Deborah Ely resisted, later saying; "when I joined ACP four years ago we were committed to a relocation at Pier 4/5. It seemed a real pity given this fantastic location and the fact that we'd been in Paddington for 20 years. I thought we should stay and make the most of the existing site." Accordingly, the Oxford Street premises were upgraded after mediation by NSW Ministry for the Arts persuaded the building's vendor the Dobell Foundation, which, with the help of Premier Neville Wran, had purchased the site from the NSW Fire Brigade for $1.5 million, mortgaged it to ACP for $750,000 a 50 рег cent discount, which Ely expected to pay off within 10 years. Its reopening increased the growing number of photography galleries in Sydney with the Byron Mapp Gallery, also in Oxford Street, Stills Gallery in Elizabeth St., the Josef Lebovic Gallery in Paddington Street and, from 15 February 1996, Toast II in Commonwealth Street. Architect James Grose refurbished the ACP by opening the facade up to the street and adding a two-storey extension with a central staircase in a construction by John Lewis and Luigi Rosselli, which integrated galleries, library, darkrooms, studio, digital imaging facilities, specialist bookstall and a restaurant, the latter through an arrangement negotiated protractedly over 1993–1994 variously with entrepreneur Rene Rivkin with caterer Maggi Agostini, then Victoria Alexander and others, to lease the shopfront, with the ACP offices and gallery behind.

A temporary closure in September 1993 saw refurbishments begin, with further assistance from the Ministry of $50,000 and also its loan of $300,000. In the interim the gallery opened at 27–31 Abercrombie St., Chippendale (6 km closer to the CBD and now housing Galerie pompom) under the name Temporary Hoarding to continue with a few shows into November 1994, including Reflex (12–27 August), sustained by curator/publicist Susan Charlton organising brochures and "Sydney Artbus" public tours. It was not until March 1996 that NSW Premier Bob Carr reopened the centre and launched its first show since December 1994, Inheritance, and its café, which was ultimately a joint venture between Stefano Manfredi of Restaurant Manfredi and Barry McDonald (B & J Lizard produce) and named La Mensa.