University Art Gallery

Out of the Archives

This exhibition is a small selection from the thousands of photographs in the University's Archives Collection and focuses upon the early period of the Hawkesbury Agricultural College (H.A.C).

The images within this exhibition are attributed to Charles Kerry & Co., one of Australia's earliest and well known photographers and were curated and produced by Juliana Swatko.

Charles Kerry and Co photographed HAC, over a 20 year period from around 1897-1917 and there are glimpses within these images of the challenges that the pioneers in agricultural education and experimentation faced, as well as their social pursuits, of Empire Day celebrations and bike trips to the Jenolan caves.

In addition to H.A.C being an education institution, it was also an experimental farm researching a wide variety of crops and agricultural techniques and was awarded the role of official purveyors of cheese to the Governor of NSW in 1901, as well as pioneering the artificial insemination of bees .

As Robert McFarlane, states in his catalogue essay:

'Kerry and Co's photographs from Richmond echo the aspirations of a soon to be federated Australia in which survival on the land needed prudent, intelligent decisions and scientific knowledge, through agricultural education, began to be valued as highly as water.'