WARNING : Do not emulate this couple in parks or on Bondi Beach as you will frighten the Cobb and Co. horses and the coppers will capsicum spray you and issue an on the spot fine as well . It is the catalogue cover for an exhibition staged by the Museum of Fine Arts , Houston , USA, the Australian National Gallery , Canberra , and the Royal Academy of Art, London . The embracing couple were reflected in mirrors at a bistro , Place de Italie , Paris , 1932. The exhibition concentrated mainly on work by recognised American and European photographers .
However , one photographer included , with a strong Australian connection , was the New Zealand born Boyd Webb , his unusual work entitled Lung, l983 , in the Australian National Gallery collection, shown below .
He had studied sculpture at the Elam School of Art , Auckland , from 1968 to 19 71; awarded a Master of Arts degree in sculpture at the Royal College of Art in London , he was also a photographer who worked in video, sculpture and installation art . His work had been exhibited in Europe and Australasia . At the time of the above exhibition he was living in London and had visited Australia as part of the 1986 Adelaide Festival.
At the time of the exhibition the ANG held 12,000 Australian and international photographs in its Department of Photography . In l988 the Gallery had mounted Shades of Light : Photography and Australia 1839-1988, which had surveyed for the first time the history of photography in Australia .
Our catalogue is from the collection of Australian art historian, the late Margaret Vine, of Magnetic Island. More art books and ephemera from her collection are in Special Collections, James Cook University Eddie Mabo Memorial Library , Townsville .
