Hedda Morrison

Hedda Morrison (1908-1991) was born Hedda Hammer in Stuttgart, Germany where she acquired her first Box Brownie at the age of 11. In 1929, against her parent's wishes, she enrolled at the State Institute for Photography in Munich, and during the Depression, she assisted photographers Adolf Lazi and Olga Linekelman. Ignoring the German fashion for 'new realism' and modernist formalism that emphasised the construction of the pictorial surface, Morrison focused on folk culture strongly linked with nature and the landscape. In 1933 she travelled to Peking, where she became the manager of Hartung's Photo Shop. In 13 years she built a collection of images of 'old' China, arranged thematically in groups such as 'Handicrafts', 'the Forbidden City', 'the Summer Palace', 'Temples', 'Ming Tombs' and 'Lost Tribes'. In 1940 she met Alistair Morrison, a correspondent for The Times. Hedda and Alistair married in Peking in 1946. Around the time of the Communist Revolution the couple moved to Sarawak, Borneo where Alistair was a District Officer with the British Colonial Service. Morrison often travelled with him documenting changes to traditional lives and cultures. In 1967 Morrison moved to Canberra, where the couple lived until she died. The Hedda Morrison Photographs of China 1933-1946, comprising of 5000 photographs and 10000 negatives, are held at the Harvard-Yenching Library. Major publications by Morrison include Travels of a photographer in Peking (1987), A photographer in Old Peking (1985), Life in a Longhouse (1962), and Sarawak (1957).