Early Tauranga in Colour – 1850s to 1900s

Hand-coloured Photography in Tauranga Moana
Part 1 – 1850s to 1900s

Portraits of Rev. Andrew and Euphemia Maxwell with children, c.1859
Twin hand-coloured cased ambrotypes, taken by unidentified photographer in Victoria, Australia
Courtesy of The Elms Foundation Image Collection, Pae Korokī Ref. 2008.003

Almost as soon as photography had been invented, the drawbacks of only being able to produce black-and-white images were being addressed by hand-colouring of the photographs, initially using dry powdered pigments, later with watercolour and oil-based colours. The earliest hand-coloured photographs to appear in New Zealand were probably daguerreotype and ambrotype portraits of family members taken elsewhere. Euphemia Maxwell brought the delicately coloured ambrotypes of her family, taken around 1859 in Victoria, with her when she emigrated to Wellington in 1865, and then to Tauranga in 1887 upon inheriting The Elms from her sister Christina Brown, widow of Rev A.N. Brown. [1] Their clothes and the tablecloth have been embellished with delicate red and blue washes, a slight blush has been added to the cheeks, and tiny spots of gold leaf have been used to highlight Andrew’s watch fob.

Portrait of Margaret Torrens Stewart, c. 1860s
Copy of hand-coloured albumen print by unidentified photographer, Co. Tyrone, Northern Ireland
Courtesy of Tauranga City Libraries, Pae Korokī Ref. 04-095

This hand-coloured portrait of Margaret, wife of Katikati settler George Vesey Stewart, was taken in Northern Ireland perhaps a decade before their arrival in 1875. [2] It reveals both a skilled photographer and a sensitive colourist with a touch for subtle shading.

Portrait of Rev. Alfred Nesbit Brown, c. 1872-1873
Hand-coloured carte de visite print taken by George Elgin Page, 256 Queen Street, Auckland
Courtesy of The Elms Foundation Image Collection, Pae Korokī Ref. 2008.0046

Reverend Alfred Brown himself was a frequent visitor to photographic studios, and in late 1872 or early 1873 had a portrait taken at the premises of George Page at 256 Queen Street, Auckland. [3] Supplementary flesh tones and grey shadows in the hair were roughly added, perhaps to compensate for over-exposure and poor contrast in the albumen-based carte de visite print.

Portrait of Rev. Alfred Nesbit Brown, taken by Hemus & Hanna, Auckland, c. 1879-1880
Hand-coloured solar enlargement of cabinet portrait by Universal Copying Co., San Francisco, 1881
Courtesy of The Elms Foundation Collection, Ref. 1935.0016

The late 1870s brought an increasing availability of solar enlargements to New Zealand. In 1880 Tauranga photographer Charles Spencer was appointed agent for the Universal Copying Co. of San Francisco, who offered hand-coloured enlargements copied “from all kinds of family photos.” Brown commissioned an impressive enlargement of a cabinet portrait originally taken at Hemus & Hanna’s Auckland studio a year or two earlier. [4] It seems likely that a handsome coloured portrait of Spencer’s mother-in-law Jane Sellars née Faulkner, similarly matted and framed, was also produced using the services of the Universal Coyping Co.

Carte de visite portraits of Annie Meers, c. 1881-1883
Photographed by Clifford & Co., hand-colouring attributed to Annie Meers
Courtesy of Tony Rackstraw (left) and Emily Campbell (right), private collections

Thomas and Annie Price arrived in Tauranga from Masterton in 1897 and opened a studio on The Strand, offering “copies, enlargements and all kinds of portrait work finished on the premises.” [5][6] Although theirs was a prolific studio, no coloured portraits from the Tauranga period have yet been located. However, Annie née Meers is known to have coloured photographs for the studio in Masterton, and probably trained as a retoucher and colourist at the studio of Clifford & Co (under the tutelage of Janet Clifford) in Dunedin, where the carte de visite portraits shown above were produced, and with her brother Robert Walter Meers in Christchurch. [8][9]

Group portrait of unidentified women wearing kaitaka and korowai, c. 1898-1905
Hand-coloured half-plate print (mounted) by Mary Humphreys, Tauranga
Courtesy of Tauranga City Libraries

Mary Humphreys, widow of Tauranga barrister Thomas Mace Humphreys, probably started taking photographs soon after her husband’s death in May 1898, as one of several income-generating projects which included opening a boarding house and becoming an insurance agent. In November 1899 she opened “a studio on The Strand to supply photographic Christmas card and photos of local scenery, Maori life, etc. … Prices from 6d to 1s 6d each.” [10][11] She also produced larger format prints, and offered hand-coloured versions, presumably for an additional premium.

Tauranga waterfront, c. 1890s-1900s, and a Bay of Plenty coastal view, c. 1920s-1930s
Lantern slide views by James Valentine & Sons (Scotland) and Bernard Sladden (Tauranga)
Images courtesy of eBay (left) and Tauranga City Libraries, Pae Korokī Ref. Photo bs-673

In the 1890s and early 1900s public lantern slide shows, which had been an intermittently popular form of entertainment for several decades, underwent a resurgence, with numerous monochrome and hand-coloured versions of New Zealand views being sold by both local and international publishers. Judea resident Bernard Sladden was an amateur photographer who created and coloured his own slides taken on trips in his yacht Severn around the Bay of Plenty coast, for shows which he presented to local audiences in the mid-1930s. [12]

Hand-coloured stereocard view, “Feast of Chrysanthemums” in Japan, c.1890s-1900s
Photographed by B.L. Singley and published by the Keystone View Company, U.S.A.
Collection of Western Bay Museum

Together with lantern slides, stereocards were imported in large numbers from international publishers, who produced enormous catalogues of views taken by an army of photographers worldwide. This example from Western Bay Museum which introduced the delights of Japan in spring time to a local family is typical of those owned and viewed in many private households in the first couple of decades of the twentieth century.

Portraits of unidentified woman (left) and Maysie Cussen in gavotte dress, c. 1890s-1900s
Hand-coloured lantern slides, probably done by amateurs
Courtesy of Tauranga Heritage Collection, Refs. 0181/07/9 and 0181/07/10

By the late nineteenth century sets of colours and brushes were widely available for purchase, enabling amateur photographers to colour their own photographs and, if the many rudimentary efforts seen of RPCs and lantern slides are anything to go by, it was a popular pastime.

Hunting party in the launch Sybil return to the wharf at Tauranga, c. 1914-1915
Hand-coloured silver gelatin print by unidentified photographer and colourist
Courtesy of Tauranga City Libraries, Pae Korokī Ref. Photo 12-034

Some, however, gained a significant degree of proficiency. This coloured view of a fowling party returning home by launch after a successful hunt around 1914-1915 shows a considerable level of skill, but may have been professionally commissioned.

Part 2 (to follow next week)

This article has been written as part of a much larger and longer-term project researching the development hand-coloured photography in New Zealand. If readers have examples of such photos in their homes or family archives, or know of others who might, and are interested in sharing them, I’d be very keen to hear from you. Please email me at gluepot@gmail.com.

References

[1] Moffat, Kirstine (2015) The Piano at the Elms, in The Lives of Colonial Objects (eds. A, Cooper, L. Paterson & A. Wanhalla), Dunedin: Otago University Press, pp. 81-86

[2] McCauley, Debbie (2022) Margaret Torrens Stewart (née Miller) (1835-1914), Debbie McCauley, Author blog

[3] Giles, Keith (?) Tokatoka Photographer, George Elgin Page, New Zealand Memories, p.8-10

[4] Payne, Brett (2019) Charles Spencer (1854-1933) – Part IV – Colour Portraits, Tauranga Historical Society blog, 15 Nov 2019

[5] Payne, Brett (2014) Visiting Price's Corner Studio on The Strand, Tauranga Historical Society blog, 3 Oct 2014

[6] Price, Thomas Edward (1898) Advertisement. Photography. T.E. Price’s Photographic Studio. The Bay of Plenty Times, Vol. XXIV, Issue 3670, p 3, 9 Mar 1898, on PapersPast

[7] Anon (2016) Masterton lensman at heart of scandal, Wairarapa Times-Age, 23 Mar 2016, on New Zealand Herald web site.

[8] Rackstraw, Tony (2020) Robert Clifford, on Early New Zealand Photographers and their Successors (blog)

[9] Rackstraw, Tony (2008) Robert Walter Meers, on Early New Zealand Photographers and their Successors (blog)

[10] Anon (1899) Untitled article, The Bay of Plenty Times, Vol. XXIV, Issue 3913, p. 2, 18 October 1899, on PapersPast

[11] Humphreys, Mary (1899) Advertisement. Photographic Christmas Cards – Local Views – Maori Scenes, The Bay of Plenty Times, Vol. XXIV, Issue 3915, p. 2, 23 October 1899, on PapersPast

[12] Anon (1936) Yacht Club Card Evening and Picture Entertainment, The Bay of Plenty Times, Vol. LXIV, Issue 12064, p. 2, 3 July 1936, on PapersPast