DAVID BEAL / DONALD HORNE: SOUTHERN EXPOSURE [1967]

A ripper book of Australian life in the 1960s with text by Donald "The Lucky Country" Horne and black and white photographs by David Beal.

Condition: Used. Rare first edition. Very poorly aged with multiple rips and tears on dust jacket, some rips and tears ‘repaired’ with tape, multiple stains overall, some small mould spots, significant yellowing of internal pages, and overall light water damage.

Signed: No
Inscribed / Personalised: Yes — name, date and year on first page in ballpoint pen.
Edition: First
Format: Hardcover
Size: 28.5 × 21.5 cm / 11.22 × 8.46 in
Pages: 143
Publisher: William Collins [Australia] Ltd.
Year: 1967
Photographs: David Beal
Text: Donald Horne
ISBN: N/A

Blurb:
"Southern Exposure is the most original picture book on Australia yet to be published. It marks a departure from the stereotyped, quasi-official, "koala and wattle" pictures which portray in verbal and visual clichés an idealised picture of Australia. As Donald Horne says in his foreword — 'Neither of us — photographer or writer — could be bothered producing the usual kind of picture book on Australia. There are as many photographs of koala bears in gum trees and of the evening picture of Ayers Rock as is very odd. We are trying to get down into the layers beneath the Australia we see as tourists in which more people live in big cities than happens in any other nation, but which is also a very empty continent, a continent which seems very strange to non-Australians.'

The text attempts to show what happened when European civilisation was transplanted to an almost empty continent on the other side of the world.

David Beal's photographs complement this text perfectly, portraying the Australian scene with sensitivity and affection. His observation of people and places is intensely personal; selective rather than comprehensive. The 102 pictures in this book have been chosen from many thousands to present a cross-section of life as it is today in this great Pacific continent. They show superbly the varied facets of Australian life; from the brooding deserts to the crowded suburbs, from the sophistication of a first night in Adelaide to the simplicity of a child playing hopscotch in a back street of a Sydney slum.

It is a book to treasure for its wit and poetic imagery; an honest and intelligent evocation of what life is really like in Australia today." — 1967.

Subjects:

Australia, Donald Horne, David Beal, Australian life, photography, rare books, documentary photography, Australiana.