Olive Cotton

Olive Cotton
Cotton at the beach, taken by Max Dupain circa 1930s
Born
Olive Edith Cotton

(1911-07-11)11 July 1911
Sydney, New South Wales, Australia
Died27 September 2003(2003-09-27) (aged 92)
NationalityAustralian
Known forPhotography
Spouses
Max Dupain
(m. 1939⁠–⁠1944)
[1]
  • Ross McInerney (m. 1944- her death)

Olive Cotton (11 July 1911 – 27 September 2003) was a pioneering Australian modernist photographer of the 1930s and 1940s working in Sydney. Cotton became a national "name" with a retrospective and touring exhibition 50 years later in 1985. A book of her life and work, published by the National Library of Australia, came out in 1995. Cotton captured her childhood friend Max Dupain from the sidelines at photoshoots, e.g. "Fashion shot, Cronulla Sandhills, circa 1937" and made several portraits of him.[2] Dupain was Cotton's first husband.

  1. ^ O'brien, Kerrie. "Australian photographer Olive Cotton emerges from Max Dupain's shadow". The Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 29 May 2017.
  2. ^ Olive Cotton: Photographer, Helen Ennis, National Library of Australia, 1995.