Christopher Bede Studios

item details

NameChristopher Bede Studios

ProductionFrank Hofmann; photographer; 1967; Auckland

Classificationblack-and-white prints, gelatin silver prints, black-and-white photographs, works of art, composite photographs

Materialsphotographic paper, silver, photographic gelatin

Materials Summaryblack and white photograph, gelatin silver print

Techniquesblack-and-white photography

DimensionsSight: 579mm (width), 419mm (height)

Registration NumberO.044647

Credit linePurchased 2016

Overview

This extract originally appeared in New Zealand Photography Collected: 175 Years of Photography in Aotearoa (Te Papa Press, 2025).

Christopher Bede Studios was formed by Frank Hofmann and Bill Doherty around 1950. It focused on home portraiture but also operated a studio, and this photograph was probably taken to promote its new premises being opened in Auckland in 1967. The image clearly sets out to demonstrate the varieties of photography the studio could undertake, from fashion and product photography to portraiture. It is pure advertising though, for it would be fanciful to imagine four photographers actually working simultaneously in the same studio space. The studio had branches in other centres, and in 1970 it claimed to be New Zealand’s largest photographic organisation. In 1975 it became Bede Photography.