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Ribboned sweetlips (Plectorhinchus polytaenia)

DateOctober 1997

Object numberANMS1467[510]

NamePhotographic slide

MediumColour transparency film

DimensionsOverall (inc carrier): 50 × 50 mm

ClassificationsPhotographs

Credit LineAustralian National Maritime Museum Collection Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program by Valerie Taylor in memory of Ron Taylor

Terms

DescriptionThis photographic collection represents the career of filmmakers and ocean conservationists Valerie Taylor AM (born 1935) and her late husband Ron Taylor AM (1934-2012). The couple pioneered skin-diving, scuba diving and underwater photography and cinematography in Australia. Valerie was national spear fishing champion for three years in the 1960s, Ron for four years, however the couple soon stopped fishing and shifted focus to shark research, photography and film. They made chain mail diving suits to film sharks and became strong advocates for shark preservation. Ron and Valerie Taylor were committed to the documentation of a vast array of underwater wildlife. This archive features photography of corals in the Great Barrier Reef and in Indonesia. Many of the images are close ups, and are largely documented with names and annotations, offering revealing facts on species such as the Gorganian soft coral. The images taken at the Great Barrier Reef are a valuable visual record of a reef that is rapidly deteriorating in condition to this day. The Taylor's have recieved great acclaim for their wildlife photography, in 1997 Valerie winning the American Nature photographer of the Year for her photograph of a whale shark swimming with a boy in Ningaloo Marine Park, Western Australia.SignificanceThis photographic collection is significant as the life's work of Australia's leading pioneering ocean conservationists, media personalities Ron and Valerie Taylor. It has strong aesthetic and scientific significance and joins a collection of the couple's technology and apparel already in the ANMM collection.

This group of photographs covers a wide variety of coral species in diverse habitats and locations.

The photographic collection dates from the 1950s until the 2000s, from when the couple met as divers and spearfishing champions, across all their years accumulating knowledge & expertise, underwater film & photographic experience and TV fame which saw them become two of the world’s top shark specialists - Ron, the can-do action man innovator and Valerie as his bold, beautiful photographer partner, both of whom swam amongst, baited and filmed sharks at breathtakingly close quarters.

The collection represents their career arc, shark hunters whose growing awareness of the fragility of species and marine ecosystems led to their strong, early and continuing advocacy as protectors, researchers and ocean environmentalists.

Together the couple opened the underwater world to early Australian television audiences after the medium was introduced to Australia at the Melbourne Olympic Games in 1956. In the main Valerie was the photographer and Ron the cinematographer.

The subject scope is broad representing work from early diving and filming expeditions along the NSW and Queensland coasts for Movietone News and other television programs, to filming and research expeditions from inland ponds in Australia's interior to South Africa and across the Pacific. It includes benchmark imagery of many species and habitats including around their holiday home at Seal Rocks NSW, and Heron Island on the southern fringes of the Great Barrier Reef, and cultural excursions into the popular imagination in film shoots, including the blockbuster Jaws, released in 1975. It also includes imagery of coastal communities in Papua New Guinea, Indonesia and in the Pacific.

Valerie Taylor has been much awarded for her underwater photography and in 1997 Valerie won American Nature Photographer of the year sponsored by the American press Club for a photograph of a whale shark swimming with her nephew in Ningaloo Marine Park.