Design and Art Australia Online

professional photographer, came to Victoria from Scotland in search of gold in the early 1850s (probably 1852) aged about twenty. Obviously unsuccessful, he then worked for the Melbourne photographic firm of Meade Brothers . When Meades closed Crombie briefly set up his own studio in Britannia Chambers on the corner of Bourke and Russell streets, advertising as a daguerreotype portraitist on 1 January 1855. This was not a success either; by the middle of the year Crombie was in Auckland, New Zealand. There he became a most successful, and flamboyant, photographer.

Between June and September 1856 he reputedly took 1088 portrait daguerreotypes in Auckland, then left on a photographic tour of Christchurch (1857), Nelson, Napier and other South Island towns (1858). After revisiting photographer friends in Melbourne to learn all the 'latest novelties in photographic science’, he was (belatedly) offering ambrotypes at his Auckland studios on his return in October 1858.

Crombie returned to Britain in 1862, farewelling his public in the New Zealander of 2 May, where he acknowledged: 'I arrived among you very imperfect in my profession, and am conscious still of many shortcomings, being, as far as photography is concerned, entirely Colonial-bred. I am very anxious to acquire that knowledge at the fountain head’. Crombie’s 'Colonial-bred’ wet-plate panorama of Auckland, however, was good enough to be awarded a medal in that year’s London International Exhibition.

The lectures he delivered to two Glasgow photographic organisations on the 'slow and feeble’ rate of advancement of New Zealand photography and the 'petty jealousies’ of local photographers were reported in New Zealand in November 1862. Less than three years later, after marrying Harriet Berry, Crombie returned to Auckland, to find that his disparaging remarks had stimulated rather than decreased business. In 1872, after a very successful seven years, he sold up and left for London. Five years later he decided to return to Auckland. His final contact with Australia came in December 1878, when he died at Melbourne en route.

Writers:

Staff Writer

Date written:

1992

Last updated:

2011