Ben Apfelbaum

PLANTING DREAMS : A NEW EXHIBITION @ THE STATE LIBRARY

To coincide with the arrival of Spring and to celebrate the 200th anniversary of the Botanical Gardens the State Library Of New South Wales has mounted a comprehensive exhibition devoted to Australian garden design. The exhibition is in two parts – the history of garden design through the Library’s’ Collection, and  photos of innovative gardens of public parkland created since 1980.

In the history section there are beautiful detailed nineteen century drawings of Australian native plants, Botanic Garden plans, and multi-media images of the suburban gardens in the 1950s.The second section is the result of the State Library commission architect and writer Howard Tanner interviewing leading landscape designers working in New South Wales. The material gathered, the Contemporary Garden Survey, will be an important resource in this area.

The second part of the Project was to commission leading garden photographers Jason Bush, Murray Fredericks, Sue Stubbs, and Nicholas Watt to record a selection of the outstanding gardens. Each of the photographers reveals a different take on the subject they have  all brought to the exhibition wonderful images of some of the state’s’ final new landscapes.

Website – State Library Of New South Wales- www.sl.nsw.gov.au

Images by Ben Apfelbaum (c).

 

Published by Ben Apfelbaum

My photography began when my father handed me the proverbial brownie box camera as a child. As cameras developed I went through Fujica and Olympus range finders graduating to my first single lens reflex camera, the Minolta SRT101, the latter being the greatest facilitator to my growth as a photographer. Digital photography has only added to this. I was a regular contributor to Camera Craft magazine (Australian Camera ) for over three years. During Australia’s Bicentennial year (1988) I made it a personal project to document the celebrations. This culminated in the creation of a book of my photos which was published in 1989. The book was called CELEBRATING AUSTRALIA and came with an accompanying calendar. My works have appeared in a number of publications including the coffee book entitled MY AUSTRALIA (1989), publisher Robertsbridge Severn. This book had a preface by the then Australian Prime Minister Bob Hawke. I was a co-photographer on a book entitled SYDNEY- DISCOVER THE CITY with text written by Robert Treborland. Major Mitchell Press was the publisher. Also for two years I was the photographer for calendars celebrating Sydney’s multicultural communities. The two calendars were entitled MULTICULTURAL SYDNEY. My work appeared in a group exhibition held at Sydney’s Town Hall pertaining to the diversity of life in South America to raise money for orphanages there. I have over one hundred photos stored in the New South Wales State Library archive. I had a solo exhibition held in 2007 entitled Ben’s Lens at the Sydney Jewish Museum which celebrated the vibrancy of the Sydney Jewish community. Some of these photos are on the Museum’s permanent display. I have exhibited internationally firstly at the Spruill Gallery in Atlanta Georgia, united states, and in an exhibition entitled Kosher and Co at the Jewish Museum in Berlin. Currently I am a regular contributor to J-Wire and this esteemed publication.