Duryea Townsend (8 results)

Hardcover. Condition: Very Good. First Edition. [Adelaide, Townsend Duryea], 1868. A large quarto album (approximately 415 × 365 mm), containing 18 albumen paper portraits (each approximately 280 × 210 mm) mounted on the rectos of cloth-hinged thick card leaves interleaved with guards, plus one leaf of letterpress (see below). Contemporary half roan and cloth, lettered and tooled in gilt, with a binder's ticket on the front pastedown ('Bound at the "Register" Office, Grenfell Street, Adelaide'); covers slightly worn; leaves slightly cockled; one guard missing; most photographs lightly discoloured near the right-hand edge; a few light spots of foxing (mainly to the guards and the versos of the mounts) and some minor signs of age and handling, but overall in excellent condition. The subjects include some of the most prominent figures in early colonial South Australia. In order of appearance, the portraits depict John Morphett (President), Henry Ayers, Charles Hervey Bagot, John Henry Barrow, Charles George Everard, John Baker, William Wedd Tuxford, Thomas Elder, William Peacock, William Morgan, Thomas Hogarth, John Tuthill Bagot, Thomas English, Henry Mildred, John Crozier, William Parkin, John Hodgkiss, and Emanuel Solomon. The 'South Australian Advertiser' for 20 August 1868 records that: 'Mr. Duryea is preparing a parliamentary group, containing the members of both Houses of the Legislature, which promises to be an effective affair. The members of the Council have already given him sittings, and a fine series of portraits is the result'. In the subsequent months Duryea exhibited the photographs at his King William Street studio, but most accounts refer to them assembled as a group around Morphett. This photo-collage, with the portraits all heavily cropped, is almost certainly the basis for a contemporary carte de visite published by Duryea (see SLSA B 9258). However, most of the images in this album appear to be rare (or even unrecorded) in their uncropped form; indeed, the only other examples we located were of Henry Ayers and Charles Hervey Bagot. It is also rare to find photographs of early colonists at all, let alone of this size, quality and quantity. The guard leaves for the portraits of Morphett, Hogarth, J.T. Bagot and Mildred contain manuscript biographical details in a single hand. Although we have not identified the writer, it is likely to be one of the eighteen MLCs, as he refers to 'our chamber' in the entry for Morphett. The portrait of C.H. Bagot is accompanied by a similar short biography, but this time in letterpress (and misspelling his middle name as 'Harvey'). C.H. Bagot, English, Mildred, Crozier, Parkin and Solomon are identified in another hand on the mounts, beneath the image.

Hardcover. First Edition. [Adelaide, Townsend Duryea, circa 1866]. A photograph album (254 × 340 mm), containing a magnificent panorama of Adelaide, comprising five roughly uniform albumen paper photographs mounted as issued (slightly overlapping) to form a continuous image (124 × 880 mm) on a linen-backed card mount (244 × 951 mm, folded into three), plus 12 albumen paper photographs (nine of them around 130 × 200 mm or the reverse, one 130 × 172 mm, and the last two approximately 220 × 285 mm) mounted on the rectos of stiff card leaves. Original russet pebble-grain cloth lettered in gilt on the front cover; cloth slightly flecked, with minor wear to the extremities; endpapers foxed, with slight loss to silverfish (and the rear free endpaper is missing); leading edge ribbon ties appear never to have been inserted; mounts lightly cockled, and occasionally lightly spotted and foxed; bottom margin of the final mount lightly stained, with trifling loss to silverfish; minimal signs of age and use; overall, a very pleasing copy, with the photographs - and in particular, the stunning panorama - in uniformly fine condition. The twelve individual photographs are captioned in pencil on the mounts: 'View in botanical gardens - showing Asylum', 'View in Botanical Gardens', 'View in Gardens', five captioned simply 'Botanical Gardens', 'Bridge between N & S Adelaide', 'near Willunga', and two captioned 'Willunga' (both superb large-format prints). New York-born Townsend Duryea (1823-1888) emigrated to Australia (Melbourne) in 1852, and commenced work as a photographer the following year. In 1855, he relocated his studio to Adelaide. By the early 1870s Duryea's panoramas, royal portraits and prizes won in Society of Arts photographic competitions had made him famous ('Australian Dictionary of Biography'). Much more detail on Duryea may be had from the lengthy article in Joan Kerr's 'Dictionary of Australian Artists . to 1870'. However, the panorama in this album is not the one described in Kerr ('a fold-out 360-degree panorama of Adelaide taken from the tower of Adelaide Town Hall in 1865 was the album's major feature'), nor is it the larger panorama 'taken from the top of the GPO tower soon after it was completed in 1870'. The present panorama is taken from a local rise in North Adelaide and sweeps left to right from the hills towards the sea. All of these panoramas are very rare indeed, not least because 'Duryea's studio and enormous collection of glass-plate negatives, stated to number 50 000, were destroyed by fire in 1875'. This catastrophe effectively ended Duryea's career as a photographer. It must assuredly account for the genuine scarcity of material by Duryea on the open market (other than bread-and-butter carte de visite portraits). This album is very rare in our experience (and if the available records are any guide, for long before we came on the scene in the mid-1970s). Although this is the fourth example we have handled, it is also only the fourth one we have seen on the open market in that time. We have inspected three other examples in institutions; all seven copies are bound similarly, and contain the same panorama. However, the balance of the contents varies in quantity and image selection in each instance. Duryea began to advertise these albums in Adelaide newspapers in August 1866. One such, from the 'South Australian Register' for 28 August 1866 reads: 'DURYEA'S VIEW ALBUMS. These Albums are neatly bound in cloth, and form a beautiful acquisition either for the drawing-room table or transmission home. A PANORAMIC VIEW of the CITY of ADELAIDE and the SUBURBS, three feet in length, has been introduced as a Frontispiece; and as a further advantage purchasers have the privilege of choosing Photographs from a large Album, containing 90 of the most interesting and picturesque Views of Adelaide and the Country. The above are open to the inspection of the public at Mr. Duryea's Studio, 66 and 68, King William-street. Any of the Views mentioned above can be had separately. Photographs of Gentlemen's Country Seats, Business Offices, Shops, &c., taken at the shortest notice by Ross's Improved Wide Angle Lens'. Provenance: Edwin Ashby (1861-1941), South Australian property developer and naturalist; by descent. While Ashby was obviously not the first owner of this album, its numerous images of the Botanical Gardens must have appealed to him. The fine gardens he established at his property 'Wittunga' at Blackwood in the Adelaide hills after the turn of the century were later donated to the State by his heirs, and are now the Wittunga Botanic Garden.

Albumen print photograph, carte de visite format, 102 x 63 mm; verso with imprint of 'T. Duryea, By Appointment to H.R.H., Ryan St., Moonta'; both the print and mount are in flawless condition.

Four albumen print photographs, cabinet card format, 161 x 103 mm (mounts); rectos all with the embossed silver imprint of 'T. Duryea, 51 Rundle Street, Adelaide'; to the verso of one is a dedication inscription in ink written by the sitter which has been scratched out (possibly by a jealous later partner?), of which we can still make out the words 'To [.] with best love from Jessie'; all are superb prints with beautiful tones; the mounts are clean and stable. An interesting quartet. We believe this young female performer dressed in stage costume - including gypsy attire, with a cigar - may be local Adelaide vaudeville performer Jessie Thorne, who was a member of the Elite Vaudeville Company.

Quarto (290 x 230 mm), embossed green leather decorated in gilt (upper board detached and lacking backstrip); title leaf with later family member's inscription identifying the original owners of the album as 'Janet and William Howard, Alma Plains - Dalkey'; containing a total of [82] albumen print photographs - [73] in carte de visite format, [9] in larger cabinet card format - and [1] small tintype photograph, all window-mounted (i.e. they are removable); the majority of the sitters are identified either on the album page or on the verso of the photograph, sometimes accompanied by a brief biographical note (the annotations are in a mixture of nineteenth-century and more recent hands); many of the families appear to have a connection with the Alma Plains district and were apparently associated with the Church of Christ: surnames includeHoward, Lawrie, McLachlan, Barr, Gore, Cope, Wilson, Good, Judd, Woolcock, Watson and McGregor; numerous South Australian studios are represented, including those of EdwardFarndell, Townsend Duryea, Edwin Marchant, Spicer Adey, Otto von Hartitzsch, George Freeman, Rushton & Just, and Stump & Co.; a small number of the portraits are by Scottish studios; the photographs are all in good condition, and the album leaves are clean and free from foxing, (some occasional tears to the window mounts).

Albumen print photograph, carte de visite format, 102 x 60 mm (mount); captioned in the image 'Sir Anthony Musgrave / Melbourne copy'; verso with the lithographed back mark of 'C. Niesche, Photographer and Picture Frame Manufacturer, 97 Rundle St., Adelaide'; in good, clean condition; the corners of the mount have been trimmed so the carte could fit into an album window mount. Sir Anthony Musgrave (1828-1888) served as Governor of South Australia (1873-77) and,after a term as Governor of Jamaica, he was Governor of Queensland from 1883 until his death in 1888. According to the State Library of South Australia, this studio portrait of Musgrave sporting a spotted tie was taken by Townsend Duryea during Musgrave's term as Governor of South Australia. This is, however, a copy print of the original, sold by the Adelaide firm of Charles Niesche. The cryptic phrase 'Melbourne copy' beneath the caption perhaps indicates that this image was circulated throughout the colonies shortly after Musgrave's death in Queensland in 1888, to be sold as a commemorative carte de visite by interested picture sellers and photographic studios. Niesche was at 97A Rundle Street from 1875 right up until 1891.

Albumen print photograph, carte de visite format, 104 x 64 mm (mount), rectowith a contemporary caption in ink identifying the sitter as 'Edw. N. Wigg' and dated December 27 1868; versowith the illustrated back mark of Adelaide's most prestigious photographer, Townsend Duryea, and contemporary note in pencil 'Son of E. S. Wigg'; both the print and mount are in very good condition. A fine and very possibly unrecorded vignette portrait of a bespectacled and bookish-looking Edward Neale Wigg at the age of 21, taken relatively soon after he had commenced working in his father's Adelaide bookshop, and prior to his marriage to Jessie Davidson in 1871. Prominent Australian businessman Edward Neale Wigg (1847-1927) was the eldest son of Adelaide bookseller E. S. Wigg. Born in New Zealand, he was educated at J. L. Young's Adelaide Educational Instituition, where he was an outstanding scholar. He entered his father's business on leaving school in 1867, and the firm then became known as E. S. Wigg & Son. Following his father's death he became head of this extremely successful enterprise and remained so until 1910, when he sold his interest in the business to his in-laws, the Davidson family. From the late 1880s on, Wigg was a major mining investor. He served asa director of Broken Hill Proprietary Ltd. from 1890 to 1906, and as its Chairman of Directors, 1897-1899. He was also a director of the Lady Evelyn gold mine atCoolgardie, the Ivanhoe mine at Kalgoorlie, the Bon Accord Cape York Peninsula Syndicate, and the Mount Lyell Mining Co. He bequeathed most of substantial estate to the University of Adelaide for medical research.

Albumen print photograph, carte de visite format, 106 x 64 mm, recto of mount inscribed in ink in lower margin 'Jnr. Duryea'; verso with the Townsend Duryea (senior) back mark advertising his firm as 'By Appointment to H.R.H. the Duke of Edinboro [sic]' and 'By Appointment to H.E. Sir Jas. Ferguson [sic], Bart.'; the albumen print has a tiny amount of foxing, but is otherwise very clean; a beautiful, sharp image. A fine vignette head-and-shoulders portrait of the photographer's eldest son at the age of around 17. Townsend Duryea (junior) was born in Adelaide in 1854. He was the eldest of the 12 children of New York-born photographer Townsend Duryea (senior), who, along with his brother Sanford, was one of the most significant of South Australia's pioneer photographers. Townsend (junior) and his brothers Edwin, Richard and Frank would all follow in the footsteps of their father and uncle and become professional photographers. Although he appears to have been associated in the 1870s with the Adelaide Photographic Company, Townsend (junior) first set up as a photographer with a studio under his own name in Moonta, on the Yorke Peninsula, from around 1880. From 1884 he was back in Adelaide, where he continued working as a photographer for the remainder of his career. He died in Port Pirie in 1925.