History of kauri industry caught on camera

AW Reed, Tom Greenwood, his son John and AH Reed stand on a log, with Arthur West and Don McEwan by the cab. (Photo/Tudor Collins, Advocate files)

The Kauri Museum at Matakohe is renowned for its focus on the timber industry that shaped colonial New Zealand, much of that history captured by another kind of focus - the camera.

Over 1200 of Northland-born photographer Tudor Collins' images are held in a collection at the museum, many of them now hanging on the walls in a new exhibition devoted to Collins' work, called Man of Many Faces.

The exhibition is a launching point for an online photo competition the museum has initiated to support the Keep Kauri Standing programme to stop the spread of the deadly kauri dieback disease.

"We have chosen the theme All Things Kauri to highlight the importance and diversity of kauri through the modern camera lens," the museum's chief executive Lisa Tolich said.

The Northland-only competition has three categories: primary school student, secondary school student and open. As long as the entry is based on a photographic image, the work can take any form, Ms Tolich said.

The judges will choose from entries uploaded to the museum's website
(http://awards.kau.nz/), with four entries from each category shortlisted as finalists.

Those works will be hung at the Kauri Museum, with the winners announced in August.

Collins is best known for his work as the "kauri cameraman", capturing the glory and grandeur of standing kauri while also documenting the loss of the forests through the timber and gum industries.

He was born in 1898 at Towai and lived a varied and eventful life, working in a number of occupations before settling on photography.

He was working in bush near Whangarei when he bought his first camera, aged 15.

Trained as a machine gunner, World War I ended as Collins was on his way to Europe and, safely back home again, he returned to work in the bush.

While working on the Coromandel Peninsula he was encouraged to develop his own film and so began his record of the timber industry, covering the kauri habitat from Northland to Coromandel.

Collins married in 1923 and moved to Warkworth where he opened a photographic business. He also photographed many of New Zealand's biggest events from the 1930s to the 50s, on commission by the Auckland Weekly News.

Tudor Washington Collins died in 1970.