| Photographic History & Collecting: |
The
Australian and New Zealand Photographic History Web Ring Homepage
Early
Photographers of Southern Queensland
19th
Century Photographers of Victoria
including 19th
Century Photographers of Geelong
The
19th Century Card Photograph in Australia & New Zealand
The
Gem and Carte de Visite Tintype
Nineteenth
Century Images of Albinism
Brisbane
Cameraholics Web Site
Brisbane based group of camera and photographica
collectors who meet monthly
Queensland
Card Collector's Society Home Page
I collect old postcards and am a long time member of the Queensland Card Collectors Society which is a club for
collectors of postcards, cigarette cards and trade cards.
Photographers of Great Britain &
Ireland 1840-1940
The most definitive listing of photographers assembled anywhere based on the
massive photograph collection of Ron Cosens, augmented by directory research by
Sandy Barrie with census and biographical input from myself.
NEW! WANTED: I collect 19th
century Australian and New Zealand photographs (especially
cartes de visite, tintypes, daguerreotypes and old family albums) and postcards.
I always welcome offers of items for sale.
I am also avidly seeking Dallmeyer, Ross,
and Beck brass
camera lenses and any early wooden glass plate
cameras by British manufacturers
such as Meagher, Houghtons, Ensign, Sanderson, Thornton Pickard, Dolland,
Sands and Hunter, Perkins and British magic lantern
projectors.
e-mail:
msafier@ozemail.com.au
 |
 I
grew up in Queensland on Australia’s Gold Coast and developed an early
interest in photography through using his mother’s Kodak Box Brownie, although
quickly I quickly moved up to a Minolta SR2, then a Minolta SRT101B before
switching to the Canon SLR system . At 15 my interest in old photographs was
stimulated by a gift of early family pictures from a relative, but it was a
Scottish cabinet photo that most drew my attention. A year later I acquired some
old photos from an antique shop and I have collected them ever since. Parallel
to this I have avidly researched my Scottish, English, Welsh and Polish
ancestry (see below).
In 1984 I graduated in Medicine from the University of Queensland and later
started working as a General Practitioner on Brisbane’s south side. In 1992 I
purchased a Brisbane family photograph album and I became more curious about
local photographers. It turned out the grand children of two of the
photographers whose work was in the album were patients of mine. Since then I
have keenly researched the lives of Brisbane photographers. This
research eventually extended to photographers from other parts of Queensland,
then Australia, New Zealand, Great Britain, Ireland and America and contact with
hundreds of descendants and relations of photographers.
Friendships with fellow collectors and researchers Sandy Barrie in Queensland,
Warwick Reeder in Melbourne
and Robert (Bob) Noye of South Australia (now deceased) greatly increased my
enthusiasm and knowledge. My collection has grown to over 25,000 photographs and
is particularly strong in Australian carte de visite images, my first passion
amongst my extensive collection that also includes many British glass plate
cameras and various SLR models. Through our mutual interests I began corresponding with Ron Cosens,
Britain’s major carte de visite collector in Yorkshire (his collection contains
over 200 000 images!) which eventually led to a
meeting in 2005, and a continuous exchange of ideas and data since. I
collaborate and provide research support for a massive and comprehensive
database of photographers of Great Britain and Ireland 1840-1940 located at
Ron's website http://www.cartedevisite.co.uk.
I have spoken to historical societies, collector’s groups and photographic
conventions on aspects of photographic history and collecting, created
photographic history websites, authored monographs on photographers, contributed
to the Routledge “Encyclopedia of 19th Century Photography” and I am currently
researching books on photographers of Brisbane 1859-1959 with Sandy Barrie and
another on
early Jewish photographers of Australia with Mike Butcher. I am also
endeavouring to write the history of the carte de visite photograph in Australia
and developing a definitive biographical database of Australia's daguerreotype
photographers.
I am currently the President and webmaster of Cameraholics (Photographic Collectors Club of Queensland),
and webmaster of the
Queensland Card Collector’s Society Inc, the Australian Photographic Collector’s
Society, the Photographic Collectors Club of Great Britain, The Daguerreian
Society and The Photographic Historical Society of Canada. I enjoy photography
especially at music concerts. Rock, pop, folk and jazz music
(see
Marcel
Safier's Jazz Page)
and drumming are my other passions. I am
keen convert to digital photography (currently a Canon G10 and 300D) despite owning more than 50 usable film
cameras! A Nikon F100 is my favourite film camera.
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