Student Life
Max Dupain at the University of Sydney
This photographic 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.
Curator
Ann Stephen
Exhibition Manager
Luke Parker
Designer
Catseye Bay
Open seven days a week
Mon - Fri: 10am - 5pm
Sat - Sun: 12 - 4pm
Until 29 June 2025
Level 4 Mezzanine
Chau Chak Wing Museum
Free
Images: Max Dupain, silver gelatin print, gift of Diana Dupain, 1951, reproduced courtesy of Chau Chak Wing Museum
Phone: +61 2 93512812
Email: ccwm.info@sydney.edu.au
Chau Chak Wing Museum
University Place
Camperdown NSW 2050
