Talk:James S. Stening

Life
James Sydney Stening was an Australian photographer who was born in 1870 in Sydney. He was then later trained to be a jeweller. Stening's first employment was with Fairfax and Roberts Jewellers, which he decided to stay with until retirement in his older age. He passed away on the 16th of September, 1953.

Photography
In the early 1890's Stening started practising photography. A few years later in 1894, he was one of the founding members of the Photographic Society of New South Wales, then later in 1916 he became involved with the Sydney Camera Circle. Also, in 1909, Stening had an impact on Harold Cazneaux with him arguably making Cazneaux's first exhibition possible. Stening also was involved with the Ashfield District Camera Club which consisted of his friends Norman Deck, Henri Mallard and Frank Hurley. His style of photography was focused on finely detailed landscapes which he gained inspiration from off Norman Deck, with a liking more to the tones of platinum printing papers. Stening occasionally delved into impressionistic soft-focus photographs printed on bromide paper. In an exhibition in 1907 at the Art Gallery of NSW which included Stening's work, one of the comments made by the reviewer was ‘what wonderful strides have been made in the art of the camera, when manipulated by an artist, and how closely the modern photographer is getting to pure pictorial representation’ 1920, he chose to leave all photographic societies. Despite this, Stening took on new technology in the form of a 35mm Leica Camera which was released in 1925, continuing his photography practise for a some time after this. The Art Gallery of New South Wales later received a donation of his negatives from Norman Deck.