Isn’t the NSW Public Service the last place you’d find a rich culture of image making and unofficial creative practice? You might be surprised. Research into the history of the NSW Government Printing Office indicates that – far from being a dry account of mundane printing tasks – the final three decades of the Government Printing Office (1959-1989) were years of creative and resistant responses to hard times, resourceful adaptation to technological change, and a good deal of fun.
Jesse Adams Stein will take you on a rollicking ride through the eccentric working life of ‘the Guv’ – as it was known by its employees. Discover the unexpected stories that lie behind posed institutional photographs, and see how the Guv’s employees pictured their workplace through illustrations and amateur film. Witness the Guv awkwardly transform from hot-metal into computerisation, and enjoy the gallows humour that characterised the last days at the Guv in 1989.
This is a shortened version of a talk presented during History Week 2013 as part of the Speaker Connect program, a partnership between the History Council of NSW and the Royal Australian Historical Society.
Supported by Your Community Heritage.
Filmed and produced by Absorb.
