Exposing the Australians: Australiana photobooks of the 1960s

The role of the photobook has been unjustly neglected in the various histories of Australian photography. However, books primarily illustrated with photographs and celebrating various aspects of Australian life and landscape-Australiana photobooks-have been a fundamental part of the nations publishing industry since the 1920s. In the postwar decades, and particularly in the 1960s, photobooks were especially important to the course of Australian photography. In the mid-1960s some even aspired to go beyond the well-worn and conventional gift book formats to become integrated visual and written works addressing the crucial national identity issues of the day. In particular, two books-Robert Goodman and George Johnstons The Australians (1966) and David Beal and Donald Hornes Southern Exposure (1967)-can be seen to have been in dialogue with each other. These books were the highlights of a mini photobook boom that set the stage for Australias much better known photography boom of the 1970s.