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A naked couple sits on a mattress in the backyard of a terrace house, reading the newspaper, their backs to the camera. A motorbike and an assortment of pushbikes lean on the wall, a garden hose curls near an old drain, and dog\u2019s water bowl suggests there\u2019s an absent pet somewhere nearby.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s a gloriously evocative black-and-white photograph by Ponch Hawkes, typical of her work in the 1970s. Australia was undergoing a metamorphosis, emerging from decades of conservative government. Radical change was underway, with women\u2019s rights, second-wave feminism and sexual liberation in full swing.<\/p>\n
Hawkes documented those heady times and continues to do so, five decades on. Turning 80 next year, the acclaimed photographer is busier than ever, preparing for an exhibition of her paintings \u2013 a recent reacquaintance with the medium has turned into an obsession \u2013 and a survey show planned at the Museum of Australian Photography for winter 2028.<\/p>\n
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Ponch Hawkes\u2019 No title (Summer night in the backyard at Falconer Street), circa 1975.Credit: Courtesy of the NGV<\/p>\n
Her images appear in the newly published Circus Oz: From the Pram to the World Stage, and she features in the documentary The Language of Light about seven Australian photographers on SBS on Demand.<\/p>\n
Some of her 1970s work is showcased at the NGV, in Women Photographers 1900-1975: A Legacy of Light. Her shots document that heady time and illustrate the changing social dynamics, capturing everyday moments like the above in communal houses, graffiti demanding childcare and social housing, protests about gay rights and women\u2019s liberation and a whole lot more.<\/p>\n
The images seem very uncurated, I say. \u201cWe were uncurated,\u201d she says. \u201cWe were all so incredibly happy with ourselves. We all thought we were so fabulous.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was punk, not in the sense of the Sex Pistols, but everybody was having a go at everything, trying out being a filmmaker or a writer or an artist or a photographer, in my case. With an overlay of social action and community giving and receiving.\u201d<\/p>\n
Places like the Pram Factory, La Mama and Circus Oz were in their infancy \u2013 the latter and its community remains a big part of her life; she was at a barbecue fundraiser for the rock\u2019n\u2019roll circus recently. <\/p>\n
\u201cI didn\u2019t ever do the trapeze but we all tried to learn to do things. The thing is, I had strength but no grace whatsoever,\u201d she says of its early days.<\/p>\n
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Ponch Hawkes has been documenting our lives for five decades.Credit: Chris Hopkins<\/p>\n
One of the teachers was in traditional circus, which came with a particular type of training. \u201cYou\u2019re up hanging off a rope and she\u2019d happily let you wear the skin away, to see if you\u2019re tough enough, which I wasn\u2019t, really.\u201d <\/p>\n
Hawkes says it felt like the golden age: \u201cWhitlam was in, the economy was in good shape, there was full employment, rent was really cheap, interest rates were low-ish and so there was money for the arts.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201dWe were turning people away \u2013 everything we did was completely sold out. I went on tour in a band with five other women, to schools and all sorts of incredible venues, doing a show about women\u2019s work, for which we had posters … in different languages, so if we performed at a factory, people would know what we were doing… bold things like that.\u201d <\/p>\n
She contributed to Digger magazine<\/a>, the short-lived but impactful counter-culture mag that focused on politics, sex, drugs and rock\u2019n\u2019roll. Several of the images in the NGV show were first published in it, as was the essay that led to Helen Garner\u2019s sacking as a teacher, for speaking with her high school students about sex.<\/p>\n We\u2019re dining at Hawkes\u2019 favourite local, Matsuya, a Japanese restaurant in Fairfield. It\u2019s quiet and comfortable and the staff welcome her warmly. She orders the vegetable tempura with a side of horenso (cold spinach with sesame dressing, much more delicious than it sounds), while I opt for the deluxe bento box; we share the gyoza to start, plus Japanese tea.<\/p>\n Our photographer Chris Hopkins arrives and soon takes Hawkes outside to get a portrait shot, despite it being a wild and woolly day. \u201cI\u2019m ready for lunch, but am I ready for you?\u201d she quips as they head outside.<\/p>\n Ponch Hawkes.Credit: Chris Hopkins<\/p>\n When she gets back, I wonder if she took a peek at the pics? No. (Later, when she sees his fabulous shot with her hair seeming to stand on end, she\u2019s impressed and hopes we publish it.)<\/p>\n Often, Hawkes interviews people before shooting them. Everybody\u2019s got a story, she says. \u201cYou get a sense of what that story might be. Also, if it\u2019s a portrait and they need to present really well, sometimes people are really direct and go, \u2018Oh no, I look terrible from that side\u2019 \u2013 especially actors. But most people are completely unaware of how they present, so they\u2019re really trusting you for a portrait.\u201d<\/p>\n That degree of trust is a big part of what she does, perhaps best illustrated by her recent 500 Strong series<\/a>, which features 500 women over the age of 50 photographed naked.<\/p>\n Some use props to cover their faces, many grin, smile or gaze happily into the camera; all show bodies of all shapes and sizes. It\u2019s an extraordinary body of work and continues to tour around the country.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve done a lot of projects about good and worthy subjects, but this is the only one I\u2019ve ever done that\u2019s actually made real change,\u201d she says. \u201cHardly a day goes by that I don\u2019t run into someone, or someone writes me an email or a letter saying how differently they feel about things since they did the project or saw the project. It\u2019s really moving.\u201d<\/p>\n Born and raised in Abbotsford, Hawkes had three siblings; her dad was a laundryman at Abbotsford Convent and her mum sometimes worked as a cook in pubs.<\/p>\n Part of a panel of 500 Strong.Credit: Ponch Hawkes<\/p>\n Her dad played in the reserves for Collingwood and later trained local footy clubs; his family all played local footy, \u201cthey were big, strapping men\u201d.<\/p>\n Now a self-confessed diehard Collingwood fan, she didn\u2019t re-engage with footy until later in life. \u201cI can\u2019t remember what it was but I became fully engaged,\u201d she laughs, even writing a spirited defence of Mason Cox when he was attacked in an online supporters group.<\/p>\n Her miniature poodle wears a Pies jumper in a pic on her phone and her membership for the next season has just arrived in the mail. Being a Collingwood supporter means you commune with fellow supporters, \u201cno matter where they come from \u2013 that\u2019s what tribes are about\u201d.<\/p>\n We\u2019re both thrilled to see women playing Australian Rules, finally, even though the physicality of the game can mean it\u2019s sometimes hard to watch.<\/p>\n \u201cBecause we\u2019re so unused to seeing girls tackle other girls or go in head-first or slam into people or do all the things we\u2019re used to in AFL. That\u2019s one of the reasons we love it so much, it\u2019s such a brutal bloody sport.\u201c<\/p>\n Footy chat brings us to Helen Garner\u2019s wonderful book The Season, about her grandson and his local team. \u201cThat book made me feel glad to be alive and Helen\u2019s books aren\u2019t always like that… [it] was so full of joy. I just completely love her, she\u2019s such a brilliant writer.\u201d<\/p>\n Helen and Gwen\u00a01976, from the series\u00a0Our mums and us by Ponch Hawkes.Credit: Ponch Hawkes\/Museum of Australian Photography<\/p>\n I find out over lunch that it\u2019s actually a young Garner in that photo described at the beginning of this piece.<\/p>\n She also features in Hawke\u2019s series Our Mums and Us<\/a>, which features mothers and their daughters photographed at their homes. It\u2019s a wonderful snapshot of time, borne out of the realisation \u201cthat your mother was not just your mother, she was a person in her own right\u201d. In 1976, it became her first exhibition.<\/p>\n There are many similarities between their work: social realism and making art by documenting our lives, an incredible eye for detail, and a commitment to truth-telling.<\/p>\n Trailblazing publishers McPhee Gribble commissioned Hawkes to take photographs for a book called Generations, written by anthropologist Diane Bell, featuring grandmothers, mothers, and their daughters. She shot the covers of many of their books over the years; the Generations pics later formed her solo show at the NGV.<\/p>\n Social justice is a through line of her work, an integral part of her worldview. That continues to this day, with a new series underway about sexual violence and older women, a joint project with academics at Melbourne University.<\/p>\n It will involve interviews and pictures, although at this stage it remains to be seen what the images will be. \u201cIf you\u2019re homeless or you\u2019ve been assaulted, who wants a picture of that? You don\u2019t even want to be identified.\u201d<\/p>\n Hawkes at Matsuya Japanese in Fairfield.Credit: Chris Hopkins<\/p>\n \u201cPeople think that sexual violence only happens to younger women but it doesn\u2019t \u2013 and it\u2019s not only in places like nursing homes either.\u201d<\/p>\n For two years, Hawkes regularly attended the weekend Melbourne protest marches over Israel\u2019s war in Gaza. She has made art about Palestine in the past and intends to do so in the future. \u201cThe kids are going to say to us, \u2018why didn\u2019t you do something about it?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n While continuing her photographic practice, Hawkes has started painting classes again, for the first time since art school after leaving high school. She\u2019s completely enamoured by it, learning every day.<\/p>\n Ponch Hawkes’ Isolation husband\u00a0(2020) from the series\u00a0The Plague.Credit: Ponch Hawkes<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s constantly figuring stuff out \u2026 It\u2019s so testing, it\u2019s really difficult,\u201d she says. \u201cI have an incredible amount of ideas.<\/p>\n \u201cVery frequently, with work, you don\u2019t know what it is until someone tells you, or writes an article about it, or comes in and says something and you think \u2018that\u2019s what it\u2019s about\u2019, or you do know what it\u2019s about but you\u2019re keeping it to yourself, or you think it\u2019s mad,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n Tempura vegetables at Matsuya.Credit: Chris Hopkins<\/p>\n Some of what she\u2019s making harks back to work she created as a young woman. \u201cWhen I was at art school, I did a whole lot of work about animals and our relationship to animals, and it\u2019s similar work.\u201d<\/p>\n Hawkes and her partner, painter and sculptor Ian Bracegirdle, met later in life, not long after her father died. She spied him outside the Fitzroy Town Hall heading into the Fringe Furniture show and stopped; it is true love, she says.<\/p>\n![\"Ponch](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/b296cb458f86fbe63885b35047ce45ad6e7dac2a.jpeg\")
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