Ponch Hawkes

Ponch Hawkes (born 1946) is an Australian photographer whose work explores intergenerational relationships, queer identity and LGBTQI+ rights, the female body, masculinity, and women at work, capturing key moments in Australia's cultural and social histories.

Early life and education Hawkes was born in Abbotsford, Victoria, in 1946 and educated at University High School. She is self-taught, having never formally studied photography. Upon returning to Australia from the United States in the early 1970s, Hawkes, who was working as a journalist for the magazine The Digger, took up photography to enhance her journalistic work.

Work Her work has been included in major Australian exhibitions such as Melbourne Now (2013) at the National Gallery of Victoria and Know My Name (2021/22) at the National Gallery of Australia. Hawke's work is represented in the collections of numerous significant institutions including the National Gallery of Victoria, National Gallery of Australia, Queensland Art Gallery, State Library of Victoria, City of Melbourne, Horsham Regional Gallery, Monash Gallery of Art, the Women's Art Register, and the Jewish Museum of Australia. Hawkes has collaborated with the Pram factory and Circus Oz, and was the first administrator of the Women's Theatre Group in the 1970s. Hawke's first exhibited body of work, the 1976 photo essay Our Mums and Us, featured her female friends and their mothers, among them the writer Helen Garner. More recent projects have explored the ageing female body such as in the monumental work 500 strong (2021), that reclaims bodies from shame, empowers the subjects portrayed, and normalises images of older women. The under-representation of women in politics is explored in the humorous work Changing Faces: Reframing Women in Local Democracy (2020), that depicts 171 local women wearing fake moustaches and beards to challenge gender stereotypes.

Exhibitions

Selected solo exhibitions

500 Strong, Geelong Art Gallery, Shepparton Art Museum, curated by Jane Scott, 2022 Changing Faces, Bayside City Council Chambers, Melbourne, 2020 Basil Sellers Creative Arts Fellow, National Sports Museum, MCG, 2011–12 More seeing is NOT Understanding, Monash Gallery of Art, Brisbane Powerhouse, Portland, Redlands Qld, Albury, 2009 Seeing Is Not Understanding, Horsham Regional Gallery, 2009 Trading Places, Heritage Hill Museum, Dandenong and Immigration Museum, Melbourne, 2006 Risk, Monash Gallery of Art, 2005 Sensation, Chrysalis Gallery, East Melbourne, 2005 They're downstairs, North Melbourne Arts House, 2003 Todah, Jewish Museum, St Kilda, Melbourne, 2001 Ponch Hawkes--A Survey, Gippsland Art Gallery, Sale, Victoria, 2000 St Vincent’s at Home, Aikenhead Gallery, Melbourne 1999 Relatively Speaking, The Family in Words and Pictures, Chrissie Cotter Gallery, Sydney, and Centre for Contemporary Photography, Melbourne, 1998 Photoworks, Victoria University Gallery, Melbourne, 1997 Parched. La Trobe Art Institute, Melbourne, Victoria, 2024 Flesh After Fifty, Changing Images of Older Women in Art, Abbotsford Convent, Melbourne, Australia, 2021 Photography Meets Feminism: Australian women photographers 1970s–80s, a Monash Gallery of Art travelling exhibition, 2014–2015 Beyond Borders, MAP Group, Ballarat International Photo Biennale, 2015 Melbourne Now, National Gallery of Victoria, 2013–2014 Take A Bow, Ballarat Mechanics Institute, 2013 Mining The Collection, Albury City Gallery, 2011 Brummels, Monash Gallery of Art, 2011 Mapping Ballarat, Ballarat Foto Biennale, 2011 Basil Sellers Art prize, (finalist) Ian Potter Museum of Art, 2011 Timelines, National Gallery of Victoria, 2011 Mapping Ballarat, Ballarat International Foto Biennale, 2009 Beyond Reasonable Drought, Old Parliament House, Canberra and touring, 2007 Raised by Wolves, Art Gallery of Western Australia, 2006 Julie Millowick Aquisitive Prize, Castlemaine Festival (winner), 2006 Blake prize for Religious Art (finalist), 2006 Josephine Ulrick and Win Schubert Photographic Award, Gold Coast City Art Gallery (finalist), 2006 Making Hay at Shear Outback Center, Hay, NSW, and Span Galleries, Melbourne, 2006 The Interior World: photographs and photographers from Glen Eira City Council's Collection, Glen Eira City Gallery, Caulfield South, Melbourne, 2004 Documenting Australians, A pictorial history of Australian photography, Monash Gallery of Art, Wheelers Hill, 2002 Images of Australian Men, Photographs from the Monash Gallery of Art collection, travelling exhibition, 2002 Exhibit X – Group Photographic Exhibition, Lab X Gallery, St Kilda, 2002 So You Wanna Be a Rock Star, National Portrait Gallery, Canberra, 2002 Ordinary Women, Extraordinary Lives, Melbourne Museum, touring 10 venues, 2001 Woman Photographers, Monash City Gallery, 2000 Feminist Art, RMIT First Line Gallery Melbourne, 1999 Three Melbourne Photographers, Ballarat Festival, Ballarat, 1997 The Power to Move, Aspects of Australian Photography, Queensland Art Gallery, Brisbane, 1996 Six Photographers, Barry Stern Gallery, Sydney, 1995 On the Edge, Australian Photographers of the Seventies, from the collection of the National Library Australia, San Diego Museum of Art, San Diego, 1994 All in the family – Selected Australian Portraiture, National Library of Australia, Canberra, 1994 Domain of the Other, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, 1992 Defective Models – Australian Portraiture 19th and 20th Centuries, from regional, university and private collections, Monash University Gallery, 1990 Portrait Photography, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, 1989 The Thousand Mile Stare, Australian Centre of Contemporary Art, Melbourne, touring Art and Working Life, Roar Studios, Melbourne, 1988 Shades of Light – Photography and Australia 1839 to 1988, Australian National Gallery, 1988 Living in the Seventies, Australian National Gallery, Canberra, 1986 Australian Photographers, Australian National Gallery, Canberra, 1984 Photographic Work, Perc Tucker Gallery, Townsville The Critical Distance, Artspace Sydney, 1983 Melbourne Theatre Photographers, Ministry for the Arts, Melbourne, 1982 Eight Woman Photographers, Monash University Gallery, Melbourne and Developed Image, Adelaide, 1981 Woman's Work, La Trobe University Gallery, Melbourne, 1981 Self Portrait/Self Image, Victorian College of the Arts, Melbourne and touring, 1980 100 Artists, Panel Beaters Gallery, Melbourne, 1978 New Conceptualists, Tokyo, 1977 Sister’s Delight, Media Resource Centre Gallery, Adelaide, 1977 Woman Photographers, Pram Factory, Melbourne, 1976

Publications

Beyond Reasonable Drought, The Map Group of Photographers, Five Mile Press, 2009 Trading Places, text by David Crofts, photos by Ponch Hawkes, City of Greater Dandenong, 2006 Art of Reconciliation, edited by Ponch Hawkes, City of Melbourne, 2002 Australian Water Polo, A Celebration, by Shane Maloney and Ponch Hawkes, Australian Water Polo Inc. 1998 Women of Substance, Sue Jackson and Gael Wallace with photographs by Ponch Hawkes, Allen and Unwin, 1998 Unfolding: The Story of the Australian and New Zealand AIDS Quilt Projects, by Ponch Hawkes with text by Ainsley Yardley and Kim Langley, McPhee Gribble, 1994 Best Mates, A Study of Male Friendship, by Ponch Hawkes, McPhee Gribble and Penguin Books, 1990 Pay to Play, by Wendy Milson and Helen Thomas with photos by Ponch Hawkes, Penguin,1986