Magda Keaney on Julia Margaret Cameron

The Great Women Artists

Katy Hessel

Arts

4.8 • 944 Ratings

🗓️ 12 November 2025

⏱️ 41 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

I am so excited to say that my guest on the GWA Podcast is the esteemed curator, author, and expert in photography, Madga Keany. Currently the Head Curator of International Art at the National Gallery of Art, Canberra, Magda was most recently Curator at the National Portrait Gallery, Canberra, and before that, Senior Curator, Photographs at the National Portrait Gallery London, where she lead the realisation of a major re-presentation of the Photographs Collection as part of the museum’s rehaul. Keany has curated shows and published texts on Australian art, design and social history, photography that ranges from the Victorian period to fashion, conflict and portraiture, solo presentations of portraits by Irving Penn, among many others. She has written for the groundbreaking Know My Name project, that put women artists in Australia on a global stage as well as for Cindy Sherman, A World History of Women Photographers, and more. …but it was her exhibition last year that really grabbed my attention: Francesca Woodman and Julia Margaret Cameron: Portraits to Dream in', that brought together the two photographers working 100 years apart, from very different worlds, circumstances and contexts, but which showed how these pioneering women shaped the medium, with their dreamlike pictures imbued with beauty, symbolism, classicism, transformation and more… So today, I couldn’t be more excited to delve into the life of the 19th century photographer, Julia Margaret Cameron, who, aged 49 in 1863, picked up a camera and, largely self-taught, crafted her distinct bohemian style pictures with that hazy sepia glow, that proved to not only be influential in Victorian Britain, but have a huge impact on photography at large. As Cameron once said: “My aspirations are to ennoble Photography and to secure for it the character and uses of High Art by combining the real & Ideal & sacrificing nothing of Truth by all possible devotion to poetry and beauty.” And I can’t wait to find out more. People mentioned: Julia Margaret Cameron (1815–1879) Francesca Woodman (1958–1981) John Herschel (1792–1871) Artworks: Julia Margaret Cameron, Annie, 1864; https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O81145/annie-photograph-cameron-julia-margaret/ Julia Margaret Cameron, Pomona, 1872; https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O1433678/pomona-photograph-cameron-julia-margaret/ Julia Margaret Cameron, Thomas Carlyle, 1867; https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/269434 Julia Margaret Cameron, The Astronomer, 1867; https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O1433637/the-astronomer-photograph-cameron-julia-margaret/ Julia Margaret Cameron, Ellen Terry, at the age of sixteen, 1864 https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/269433 -- THIS EPISODE IS GENEROUSLY SUPPORTED BY THE LEVETT COLLECTION: https://www.famm.com/en/ https://www.instagram.com/famm_mougins // https://www.merrellpublishers.com/9781858947037 Follow us: Katy Hessel: @thegreatwomenartists / @katy.hessel Sound editing by Nada Smiljanic Music by Ben Wetherfield

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello everyone and welcome back to season 14 of the Great Woman Artist podcast. I'm so thrilled to be bringing you a fantastic series featuring conversations with artists, writers, curators and more. Just before I introduce our sponsor, I am very excited to let you know that I have written a new book. How to Live an Artful Life is out on the 6th of November
0:22.2	2025 and features a quote by an artist or writer for every day of the year. Think Tracy
0:28.6	Emin to Marino Abramovich, Zadie Smith to Ali Smith, Nan Golden to Hilton Al's, plus historical
0:34.5	writers and artists too. In the book, they offer us advice from how to slow down and pay
0:40.1	attention to daily routines and putting ideas into action. Each month takes on a different theme.
0:46.1	For example, January is about where do ideas come from? February is all about love and passion.
0:51.9	August is about beauty. November is about memory. December is about
0:55.7	joy. Because in a world where it seems that so many of us forget to look anymore, we can learn from
1:01.2	those who do. And to help the reader feel like they can apply the artist's word to their life,
1:06.6	I've written a short response to each entry to help guide and inspire you throughout the year.
1:11.9	And I've linked to where you can pre-order it from in the show notes.
1:14.8	And now for our sponsor, I am thrilled to say that this series is supported by the Levitt Collection,
1:20.7	a vast and varied art collection, which in the last eight years has become entirely focused
1:26.3	on works by women artists.
1:28.6	You can find much of this, made up of Impressionists, abstract expressionists, contemporary artists
1:33.7	and more, at FAM in Mujan, France, the first private museum in mainland Europe, devoted
1:40.0	entirely to female artists, spearheaded by Christian Levitt, who has published three research
1:46.0	books in this area. Recently, they launched The Levitt Letter, a monthly subscription-based letter,
1:52.3	advising collectors and dealers on the future trends in this specific art market.
1:57.5	Subscribers to the Levitt Letter also become members of the Levit Lounge, a community where
2:02.5	Christine shares his valuable insights and expertise, and gives subscribers direct access to visiting
2:08.4	Levitt's home in Florence and Mujan and the monthly webinar. Across all of these platforms,
	...

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