© Olive Cotton, ca. 1935, Teacup ballet “This picture evolved...

© Olive Cotton, ca. 1935, Teacup ballet

“This picture evolved after I had bought some inexpensive cups and saucers from Woolworths for our studio coffee breaks to replace our rather worn old mugs. The angular handles reminded me of arms akimbo, and that led to the idea of making a photograph to express a dance theme.

When the day’s work was over I tried several arrangements of the cups and saucers to convey this idea, without success, until I used a spotlight and realised how important the shadows were. Using the studio camera, which had a 6 ½ x 4 ½ inch ground glass focusing screen, I moved the cups about until they and their shadows made a ballet-like composition and then photographed them on a cut film negative. The title of the photograph suggested itself.

This was my first photograph to be shown overseas, being exhibited, to my delight, in the London Salon of Photography in 1935.”

(Olive Cotton; from: Ennis H. 1995, ‘Olive Cotton: photographer’, National Library of Australia, Canberra p 25)

The photograph also made it on a stamp in Australia (Date of issue: May 13, 1991), issued to commemorate the 150th Anniversary of Photography in Australia:

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