Photographs

Ellis Rowan, Chrysanthemums, ca. 1890, nla.gov.au/nla.obj-138089294

Australian artist Ellis Rowan primarily worked in watercolour and gouache, and is best known for painting Australian native flowers. She caused a stir at the 1888–89 Centennial International Exhibition in Melbourne when her painting Chrysanthemums won First Order of Merit and Gold Medal. This similar painting, depicting the same type of flower, is a more recent addition to the Library's vast Rowan Collection, the bulk of which was acquired for the nation for £5,000 in 1923.

Pictures

Our rich and varied Pictures collection focuses on Australian people, places and events, from early European exploration of the South Pacific to contemporary events.

Information article

http://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-742754582

Loke Wan Tho Collection

A large number of photographs and negatives taken by Loke Wan Tho on his ornithological expeditions to the Pacific, Asia and Europe in the 1950s and early 1960s, as well as papers, books and maps.

Collection guide

Groom Collection

About 200 books and 260 pamphlets, plus personal papers and photographs mainly related to Australian history, politics, law, literature and religion from Sir Ernest Littleton Groom.

Collection guide

Man in a leather jacket and cap seated in an old biplane

JL Turner, Mr WE Hart, the first Australian aviator in his biplane, [seated at controls, 1911?], nla.gov.au/nla.obj-144639799

Crome Collection

The Crome Collection includes papers, photographs, ephemera, aero-philatelic material, objects, books and pamphlets relating to Australian aviation collected by Ernest Alfred Crome.

Collection guide

Woman looking a large colourful colourful illustration of two birds in a tree

Ellis Rowan, Rothschild's Bird-of-Paradise, or Rothschild's Astrapia (Astrapia rothschildi), Papua New Guinea, 1917, nla.gov.au/nla.obj-138748166

Using the Pictures collection

How to find and use items in the Pictures collection.

Information article

Library services

Photo close up of a European honey bees on the honeycomb of a beehive

Mark Jesser, European honey bees on a brood frame containing capped and uncapped cells at an apiary near Griffith, New South Wales, 2025, nla.gov.au/nla.obj-3668129443

Picturing beekeeping in Australia

The latest buzz at the Library is that 50 new photos of beekeeping in Australia are now available online.

News article

Chinnery Collection

Papers, maps and a large collection of photographs related to Papua New Guinea mainly from the period 1910-1940.

Collection guide

Callen Collection

Photographs of Australian steamships, nine paintings and an unpublished manuscript 'Dictionary of Australian steamships' by Terence Callen.

Collection guide

Burke Collection

Papers, photographs, ephemera, books and journals from Europe, Asia, America and Australia ranging from 1850-1950 collected by Eric Keast Burke.

Collection guide

Sculthorpe Collection

Personal papers, manuscript scores, literary manuscripts, sound recordings and family photographs of Peter Sculthorpe, plus videos of films for which he wrote the music and television interviews.

Collection guide

Mabo Collection

Personal papers and legal material that record of one of the most important and controversial legal cases in Australian history and the life of the man who is chiefly associated with the case.

Collection guide

First Australians

York Collection

About 140 oral history interviews, the majority for his Maltese-Australian and Polish-Australian folklore and social history projects. Personal papers of York plus papers of the historian Michael Cigler. Also a large quantity of Maltese newspapers, student newspapers, radical pamphlets and ephemera.

Collection guide

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