Curio

State Library of New South Wales
Panorama of Blue Mountains scenery at Leura

Panorama of Blue Mountains scenery at Leura

November 1903
DL Pg 27
Platinum photoprint

American adventurer, singer, aeronaut, and photographer Melvin (Chester) Vaniman (1866-1912) had a passion for taking panoramic photographs from great heights. If he could not find something tall from which to take a photograph, he would erect his own thirty metre pole. ‘The acrobatic photographer’ arrived in Sydney in February 1903 after being commissioned by the Pacific cruise line Oceanic Steamship Company to take promotional photos of Australia and New Zealand.

During his time in Australia, Vaniman travelled extensively throughout the country to fulfil his commission and personal creative pursuits. The expansive landscapes, blue skies and rugged bushlands provided the perfect setting for Vaniman’s unconventional, panoramic photographic practices.

Panorama of Blue Mountains scenery at Leura was a photograph captured at Vaniman’s favourite view-point in Australia. The image is a classic example of how the eccentric photographer captured light and the natural beauty of Australia’s mountainous landscapes.

Up in the clouds..

Melvin Vaniman was a photographer with a head for heights. His panoramic photographs were nearly always taken from high above the ground and if a nearby building or ship's mast was not at hand, he erected his own 30 metre pole to achieve a bird's-eye view. His antics atop a pole in Katoomba Park in 1903 earned him the nickname 'the acrobatic photographer'. When his trusty pole didn't give him the height necessary to photograph the entire city of Sydney in a single sweep, he imported a balloon from America and spent months tethered 180 metres above North Sydney, experimenting with the new perspective. Vaniman even built his own camera, able to record panoramic views on film up to two metres in length and 50 cm wide in a single shot, to utilise the higher viewpoint.
Alan Davies and Alan Tierney, State Library of New South Wales, 2001