Fifty years separate the two commissions, but Peter Derrett was again back at the Nimbin Aquarius Festival last month, documenting the event that helped launch his photographic career.
Back in 1973, Peter Derrett was a fresh-faced UNE graduate teaching English and Drama at Lismore High School when his alma mater commissioned him to photograph the festival. Some of those images now form part of the prized State Library of NSW collection.
I had photographed for UNE’s Nucleus newspaper throughout my four years of study
“I had photographed for UNE’s Nucleus newspaper throughout my four years of study,” said Peter, who completed an Arts degree and Diploma of Education in the late 1960s and early ’70s at UNE. “Nimbin’s festival was the fourth and final in a series organised by the National Union of Australian University Students. I had photographed the festivals in Melbourne and Perth, where I also performed in a UNE ensemble (Soldier from the Wars Returning) for Stewart Faichney. The bus trip from Armidale to Perth took five days and nearly killed us.”
His time living at Earl Page College posed other daily challenges.
“During my first year we were living in the old World War 2 barracks up on the hill,” Peter remembers. “It was dreadful … freezing, with holes in the fibro walls. Then I moved into the newly built college for two years, which was much more comfortable.”
Peter was intent on becoming an English teacher when he arrived at UNE in 1967 but “happened upon many Drama people and became interested in that”. A passion for photography also found an outlet.
“I shot umpteen issues and covers for Nucleus and the university built me a beautiful heated darkroom opposite Drummond, on the back of one of the houses,” Peter said. “It was very kind of them. I also had a studio under the stage of the Arts Centre, with lighting and backdrops. I accompanied Professor Isabel McBryde on a number of her Aboriginal archaeological digs and would photograph the implements she found.
I loved UNE, the climate, the town of Armidale.
“I loved UNE, the climate, the town of Armidale. I had a lot to do with academics through the film society, the English Department and the theatre. I really enjoyed the social life and being part of that theatrical community. I used to show movies on Friday nights at Madgwick Hall – and I’d often deliberately put the film reels on out of sequence. The audience rarely noticed. I had a lot of fun.”
Theatre educator Launt Thompson was “one of the most important people in educational drama in Australia” at the time and left an indelible mark on Peter, who performed in numerous productions, and wrote and directed the experimental play Images of Man.
“The theatre and photography I learnt at UNE was a huge influence,” Peter said. “I became a founding member of the NSW Drama Association and began shooting for The Australian newspaper at UNE. Later, I studied at Trinity College Speech and Drama in London and became head of drama and theatre at Trinity Catholic College in Lismore, where I taught for 36 years.
Ros and Peter Derrett at the Aquairus 550 exhibition
“My wife Ros and I established the regional company Theatre North in 1981 and ran it for 23 years. Through it all, I kept photographing – for newspapers, magazines, theatre productions and private commissions – and produced five photographic books.”
Peter’s work has been exhibited throughout the world and in 1998 he was named Australian Fine Art Photographer of the Year. An OAM in 2007 recognised his services to drama education and regional theatre.
But few will be aware that he also reprised Images of Man for his Lismore High students to perform at the original Nimbin Aquarius Festival. “I developed a stage show with 16 students and we performed it twice on the first day of the festival at the Nimbin Town Hall.”
Lismore High students performing Images of Man in 1973
However, his recollections of the festival, now considered pivotal to Australia’s counter-cultural movement, challenge prevailing thinking.
“It has become very romanticised over the years and portrayed as a hedonistic event,” Peter said. “It was not at all like Woodstock and not a music festival but an ideas festival, where people could learn all about sustainable living. It was reported that thousands of people attended, but there were 300-400 at most, and free love and nudity wasn’t the focus.”
Photographs Peter took during last month’s 50th anniversary celebrations will again find a home in the State Library. That the earlier images survived at all is a stroke of good fortune.
“I only took four or five rolls of film at that first festival and they were pretty basic,” Peter said. “The negatives sat in my garage for 45 years, until preparations for the Aquarius 50 celebrations stimulated a hunt. Now they’re considered historic!”
