Student Life: Max Dupain at the University of Sydney

A photographic exhibition documenting student life in the 1950s

This exhibition introduces Dupain’s modernist approach to photography in a brilliant and frequently hilarious series of candid shots.

The Australian modernist photographer Max Dupain (1911-1992) documented student life at the University in the early 1950s in a brilliant and frequently hilarious series of candid shots. They show the range of student cultures and interests in the immediate postwar years.

The exhibition introduces Dupain’s modernist approach to photography which combines formal architectural backdrops with candid documentary studies of student life.

One series displays the student floats on which they performed and demonstrated major issues of the day. The Petrov affair inspired one of the floats in 1954, another includes anti-bomb demonstrations.

Black and white image of students on a float which reads "Atomic Age Misguided Messels"

Black and white image of students at the University of Sydney sit on a float in front of the Quad building.

Black and white image of three students sit smoking on a float

Black and white image of a student in a tall hat surrounded by balloons.

Curator: Ann Stephen

Images: Max Dupain, silver gelatin print, gift of Diana Dupain, 1951, reproduced courtesy of Chau Chak Wing Museum

Level 4

Opens 9 August

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