Frederick Unverhau

  • Artist (Photographer)
Frederick Unverhau was a nineteenth century photographer based in South Australia. He had a studio in Kapunda, where he photographed members of the local community.

Tanunda is being visited at present by a very skilful photographer (Mr Unverhau, from North Adelaide), who has been engaged for about three weeks already in typing the people, houses etc. of this neighbourhood, and will have to stay as long again, I am told, on order to meet the demand made upon him. At times, especially on clear and therefore favourable days, the atelier is in a state of siege. The fact is that true artists, in whatever line they may be, will always meet with success at Tanunda, while bunglers are generally left to themselves. This speaks well of the refined taste of the populace.1

By 15 June 1861 Frederick Unverhau had finished building a 'glass-house’ (studio) in the main street of Kapunda and was ready to take ‘photographic likenesses in every kind of weather’. A few weeks later, however, he advertised that he was moving to Adelaide, and expected to be there by mid-August. Either he changed his plans or his wife Sophia stayed behind, because the Births
Register for Kapunda records the birth of a son, Bruno, to Frederick Unverhau, a daguerreotype artist, on 3 October 1861. When a daughter was born at Kapunda in March 1863, his occupation was given as photographic artist. The daughter, Antonia, died eight months later.

The sale of Frederick Unverhaus’s photographic equipment in February 18652 may have marked the end of his photographic career, more so because later that year another photographer, E.B. Cardell, advertised that he would be practising the art of photography from 6 November at Mr Unverhau’s opposite Cameron’s factory in Main Street, Kapunda. From 1865 to 1870 Unverhau is listed as having a ‘fancy bazaar’ in the main street of Kapunda.

1South Australian Register, 24 June 1859.
2His advertisement in the Tanunda Deutsche Zeitung, 3 February 1865, lists a large range of musical instruments for auction and ‘complete photographic apparatus with chemicals’.

Text taken from:
Noye, R.J. (2007) Dictionary of South Australian Photography 1845-1915, Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide. CD-ROM, p.313.

Writers:

Nerina_Dunt
Date written:
2013
Last updated:
2013