Unfortunately, Adam Magennis is no longer available for our July Talking History but we are pleased to welcome Dr Stuart King to discuss The Material Geographies of Colonial Architecture of the Tasman World.
What happens if we look at colonial architectural history through materials rather than design intentions? This talk presents research concerned with the architecture of the early Tasman colonies, and its relationship with extractive industries, in this case, timber. Timber has dual standing as an extracted resource subject to trade fluctuations, and as a building material deployed in settings immediately adjacent to forests and at significant distances from its point of origin. The research exposes the complexity of such a history, quickly upsetting the nationalist edges of much contemporary architectural historiography, and the nature of the architecture that is involved.
Dr Stuart King is a Senior Lecturer in Architectural Design and History at the University of Melbourne. He is a member of the University’s Australian Centre for Architectural History, Urban Cultural Heritage (ACAHUCH), and his research focuses on Australian architectural history, historiography, and heritage with specific interest in the local, regional and global connections that have influenced Australia's nineteenth-century built environments. Stuart is a past President of the Society of Architectural Historians Australia and New Zealand (SAHANZ), past co-editor of the society's journal Fabrications: JSAHANZ, and current SAHANZ Editorial Board member.
Image: William Anderson Cawthorne (attr.), South Australian Drawings (Landing Timber for Squatter on the Coast of Spencer, n.d.), ca. 1843-1870 (Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales).
