Summary

Portrait photograph of Kodak Australasia Pty Ltd chief managing director, Thomas Baker, circa 1929.

Thsi is a soft focus portrait, possibly gum bichromate or similar process.

Thomas Baker was a significant figure in the foundation of the Australian photographic industry. In 1884, at thirty years of age, he established a highly successful photographic manufacturing business in Melbourne, which became Australia's biggest provider of photographic material before merging with Kodak in 1908. Baker remained closely involved with the new business, acting as joint Managing Director of Kodak until the end of his life. As successful entrepreneur and then company executive, Baker helped to influence how Australians engaged with photography in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century - a boom period when photography was becoming increasingly more popular and accessible to the ordinary person.

This image is part of the Kodak collection of products, promotional materials, photographs and working life artefacts collected from Kodak Australasia in 2005, when the Melbourne manufacturing plant at Coburg closed down.

Kodak manufactured and distributed a wide range of photographic products to Australasia, such as film, paper, chemicals, cameras and miscellaneous equipment. Its client base included amateur and professional photographers, as well as specialist medical and graphic art professionals who used photography, x-ray and other imaging techniques.

Physical Description

Sepia toned photograph mounted to board.

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