In February 2000 I wrote an article for National Library of Australia News on the dance photography of Walter Stringer, who before he died donated his very extensive collection of images to the National Library of Australia in Canberra. In the light of the recent discussion about the dancer portrayed in photos of Swan Lake in my recent post about the 1958 Royal Ballet tour to Australia and New Zealand, I thought it might be worth making the Stringer article more readily available, and adding a little about some of the Royal Ballet images included in the Stringer collection.
Follow this link to the National Library of Australia News article. Please note there is an error in the caption for the Swan Lake image used in the article. It is not, of course, Anne Woolliams and corps de ballet in the image but corps de ballet in the Anne Woolliams production! This was an editorial mishap.
Unfortunately the Royal Ballet material is not fully digitised so most of it can only be viewed on site at the National Library. This non-digitised component includes an album of 43 photos relating to the 1958 tour. The album came with a list created by the photographer. What follows is a slightly expanded version of the list, although no changes have been made to Stringer’s identification of dancers or ballets.
| Accession No. | Captions |
|---|---|
| 994/1 | Les Patineurs, 1958, Susan Alexander and unidentified |
| 994/2 | Swan Lake, Act I, 1958, Elizabeth ?, Michael Boulton, Audrey Farris |
| 994/3 | Swan Lake, Act II, 1958, Lynn Seymour (Odette) |
| 994/4 | Swan Lake, Act II, 1958, Lynn Seymour (Odette) |
| 994/5 | Swan Lake, Act II, 1958, Lynn Seymour (Odette), David Blair (Siegfried) |
| 994/6 | Swan Lake, Act II, 1958, Lynn Seymour (Odette), David Blair (Siegfried) |
| 994/7 | Swan Lake, Act II, 1958, Lynn Seymour (Odette), David Blair (Siegfried) |
| 994/8 | Swan Lake, Act III, 1958, Lynn Seymour (Odile) |
| 994/9 | Swan Lake, Act III, 1958, Lynn Seymour (Odile), David Blair (Siegfried) |
| 994/10 | Swan Lake, Act III, 1958, Lynn Seymour (Odile), David Blair (Siegfried) |
| 994/11 | Les Sylphides, 1958, Valerie Taylor |
| 994/12 | Les Sylphides, 1958, Anne Heaton |
| 994/13 | Les Sylphides, 1958, Valerie Taylor |
| 994/14 | Les Sylphides, 1958, Anne Heaton |
| 994/15 | Les Sylphides, 1958, Anne Heaton |
| 994/16 | Coppélia, 1958, Robert Helpmann (Dr Coppélius), Rowena Jackson (Swanilda) |
| 994/17 | Coppélia, 1958, Robert Helpmann (Dr Coppélius), Rowena Jackson (Swanilda) |
| 994/18 | Coppélia, 1958, Valerie Taylor (Prayer) |
| 994/19 | Coppélia, 1958, Rowena Jackson (Swanilda), Philip Chatfield (?) (Franz) |
| 994/20 | Coppélia, 1958, Dance of the Hours |
| 994/21 | Coppélia, 1958 Rowena Jackson (Swanilda) |
| 994/22 | Coppélia, 1958 Rowena Jackson (Swanilda) |
| 994/23 | Hamlet, 1958, Robert Helpmann (Hamlet) |
| 994/24 | Hamlet, 1958, Robert Helpmann (Hamlet) |
| 994/25 | Hamlet, 1958, Robert Helpmann (Hamlet) |
| 994/26 | Hamlet, 1958 |
| 994/27 | Hamlet, 1958, Robert Helpmann (Hamlet) |
| 994/28 | Pineapple Poll, 1958, Patricia Cox (Poll) |
| 994/29 | Pineapple Poll, 1958 |
| 994/30 | Pineapple Poll, 1958, Patricia Cox (Poll) |
| 994/31 | Coppélia, 1958, Alan Alder |
| 994/32 | Coppélia, 1958 |
| 994/33 | Coppélia, 1958, Philip Chatfield (Franz) |
| 994/34 | Coppélia, 1958, Susan Alexander (Swanilda) |
| 994/35 | Coppélia, 1958, Susan Alexander (Swanilda) |
| 994/36 | Coppélia, 1958, Susan Alexander (Swanilda) |
| 994/37 | Coppélia, 1958, Rowena Jackson (Swanilda) |
| 994/38 | Coppélia, 1958, Rowena Jackson (Swanilda), Philip Chatfield (Franz) |
| 994/39 | Coppélia, 1958, Robert Helpmann (Dr Coppélius), Rowena Jackson (Swanilda) |
| 994/40 | Coppélia, 1958, Rowena Jackson (Swanilda), Philip Chatfield (Franz) |
| 994/41 | Coppélia, 1958, Rowena Jackson (Swanilda), Philip Chatfield (Franz) |
| 994/42 | Unknown, Rowena Jackson, 1958 |
| 994/43 | The Rake’s Progress, 1958, Anne Heaton |
Michelle Potter, 15 January 2017
Featured image: Margot Fonteyn with Kelvin Coe and John Meehan in The Merry Widow. The Australian Ballet, 1977. As featured in my article ‘Walter Stringer’s dance photography’. National Library of Australia
