Tree Fern, Botanical Gardens, Sydney (1856-1860)

A$1,800 · Offered by Douglas Stewart Fine Books

Wet plate collodion print, 200 x 155 mm, signed in the negative lower left M. F. Moresby ; on section cut from a mid-19th-century album leaf, with the photographer s pencilled caption on the mount below the image: Tree Fern, Botanical Gardens, Sydney ; the print has excellent clarity and tonal range, and is in very good condition; the verso of the mount is blank. An extremely early Sydney outdoor photograph which possibly dates to as early as 1856 this fine nature study was taken in the Botanical Gardens by amateur photographer Matthew Fortescue Moresby, paymaster-in-chief of HMS Iris. From the DAAO: Matthew Fortescue Moresby, sketcher, amateur photographer and clerk, was the second of the three sons of Admiral Sir Fairfax Moresby and Eliza Louisa, née Williams, of Bakewell, Derbyshire. Sir Fairfax was commander-in-chief in the Pacific in 1850-53 and all his sons served in the region. The eldest, Fairfax, died in Bass Strait when the brig Sappho was lost in 1858; John (also a gifted sketcher) was the New Guinea explorer after whom Port Moresby is named; and Matthew Fortescue (known as Fortescue or Forty’) was secretary to his father on board HMS Portland in 1852 53. During this period he visited Pitcairn Island several times and enjoyed taking walks over the Island, sketching, talking and singing’. He became very fond of the Pitcairners: truly a more innocent and delightful race could not exist’. Before taking up photography Fortescue Moresby had painted lively and competent

• Binding: Hardcover

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