The Historic Houses Trust is responsible for the conservation and management of 14 historically significant sites around NSW: houses, public buildings, gardens, urban spaces, parklands, a farm and a beach. It’s an undertaking that extends way beyond mere conservation though. The HHT aspires to shake off the dust and bring the past alive.
This is where photographer Robyn Stacey comes in. In a close collaboration with the HHT, from 2008 to 2011, Stacey was given access to the extraordinary collections of Elizabeth Bay House, Vaucluse House, Rouse Hill House & Farm and the Caroline Simpson Library & Research Collection. Stacey photographed more than 650 of the 29,000 diverse artefacts at her disposal, the results of which are now on display in the House exhibition at the Museum of Sydney and in an accompanying 167-page photographic book.
The most striking aspect of the project, however, is the way in which Stacey photographed the objects. Traditionally, museum items are consigned to their rightful spot in a taxonomical index of items. Stacey’s lush, evocatively lit and lovingly composed still-life photographs, on the other hand, restore a sense of narrative and domestic reality to the objects. They are, effectively, glimpses into 19th century colonial life. “I tried to create the impression that someone has just left the table or walked out of the room,” says Stacey. “There is a sense of human occupation in all the images.”
In one such image, the dining items of Elizabeth Bay House (table knife, c1860; Japonaiserie-decorated plate, c1830–40; egg cup trivet, 1825) are arranged to create an intimate breakfast scene – toast soldier in mid-dunk into a soft-boiled egg and all. In another, a collection of assorted recreational items from Rouse Hill House & Farm (mahogany cribbage board, c1870; dice and leather dicing cup, late 19th century; backgammon, chess and draughts pieces, 1870) are laid out as if in anticipation for the next family games night.
One image, depicting an extravagant array of fruit and heritage flora, was assembled based on records in a 200-year-old botanical journal.
“Every item in the composition is ‘correct’ for the period and the scene being depicted,” says Stacey, “from the choice of insects, to the kind of dirt, or the type of fold in the napery. Everything is supporting the narrative.” And everything is arranged just so. “If you move or remove one object it cascades throughout the whole composition, everything is so tightly balanced. You realise that the smallest element is as integral as the largest, most extravagant piece in the composition.”
Stacey approached the project with a keen interest in history – but also a fascination with the way that history is expressed in public archives. “They form the basis of a society’s collective memory,” she says. “At the most intimate and personal level it provides access to people’s private worlds.” But, as House demonstrates, it takes someone with Stacey’s artistic vision to make those worlds seem beautifully, breathtakingly alive.
House by Robyn Stacey and Peter Timms, RRP $89.95
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