Sue Davies

Sue Davies OBE HonFRPS (14 April 1933–18 April 2020) was the founder of The Photographers' Gallery in 1971, the Britain's first independent gallery of photography, which she directed until 1991.

Early life

Susan Elizabeth (Sue) Davies (née Adey), was born on 14 April 1933. She trained as a secretary and in 1954 married at 21 to jazz trombonist and alto saxophonist John R.T. Davies (1927–2004), a specialist in sound restoration of classic jazz music from 1917 to 1940. They had three children, Joanna, Stephanie  and Jessica. She worked on the Municipal Journal and then started a part-time job at the Artists Placement Group in London before taking a job at the ICA in 1968 where she was exhibitions secretary. Her interest in photography was aroused by the presence there of Bill Jay who was using the venue for his Photo Study Centre seminars, and by the ICA's Spectrum exhibition(3 April-11 May 1969) which showcased photography in Britain represent by 500 women photographers including Dorothy Bohn, and Tony Ray-Jones and Don McCullin.

Founder, The Photographers' Gallery

One of five staff at the Institute of Contemporary Arts in Dover Street London and one of 36 after it moved to The Mall, Davies experienced its period of anarchic management and overrun budget. Having hung a show by Bert Stern there in 1969, she decided to rectify the lack of a permanent gallery space for photography as a serious art form. On 14 January 1971, funded by a re-mortgage of her house, she launched such a gallery in a derelict Joe Lyons tea room which she had been in the habit of visiting after jazz sessions. Named The Photographers' Gallery, it was well positioned at 8 Great Newport Street, Covent Garden next to the Arts Theatre and around it Davies formed a photographic community in London rivalling that already established in New York. The 3500sq.ft. of space to accomodate exhibitions for the public to meet and to listen to speakers.

International figures such as Henri Cartier Bresson, Arthur Tress and JH Lartigue, showed in the space, presented talks and workshops, and were accommodated in the small bedsit at the top of the Georgian house as a way of encouraging their interaction with the Gallery patrons and attendance at parties that became legendary.

Davies registered the business as a charity and found patrons and supporters in Magnum agency photographers such as David Hurn, newspaper publishers Tom Hopkinson and David Astor who with Roy Strong (who in 1968 was encouraged by success in showing Cecil Beaton at the National Portrait Gallery) assisted her in managing the first year expenses of ₤12,000; from entry fees from 20,000 visitors, and further funding from the Arts Council covering a deficit of around ₤7,000. That year, on November 7th an Observer newspaper report described her effort;

She has worked like a demon. She found the premises and put up the money, though she's not at all rich, and she persuaded distinguished men like Roy Strong from the National Portrait Gallery to sit on her board and got Tom Hopkinson, editor of the legendary Picture Post, as chairman. As a result it is now perfectly possible that she has founded, single-handed, what may become the photographic equivalent of the National Gallery. Photographs are already 'art' in America. Victorian classic photographs change hands in the salesroom. (There is to be a big sale of them at Sotheby's in December.)

The first exhibition was The Concerned Photographer curated by Cornell Capa, and the second, a show of Edward Weston’s photography, followed by exhibitions with themes devoted to industry, fashion and landscape, and young photographers. Not all exhibitors met with approval of critics however, and in particular Davies' showings—three in as many years—of David Hamilton were condemned by Euan Duff for its "cliched pictorial symbolism , exploiting soft focus, pastel colours, country landscapes and old houses, old fashioned clothes and even white doves to give a phoney impression of heaIth-food ad naturalness; they are a sort of wholemeal stoneground pornography," exhibited "because the gallery needs the money."

Support for British photography was empowered by the appointment of Barry Lane as the first photography officer of the Arts Council in 1973 who increased access to financial support for photographic initiatives, and The Photographers Gallery was followed shortly afterwards by the creation in 1972 of Half Moon Gallery (later Camerawork,) in London, Impressions Gallery in York (also 1972) and the Ffotogallery in Cardiff in 1978, by which date The Photographers Gallery was attracting 20,000 visitors a month and was staffed by six including Australian Graham Howe, with co-founder Dorothy Bohm the assistant director. Curator India Dhargalkar started her career at the Photographers Gallery, and Zelda Cheatle, who in 1989 set up her eponymous commercial space, worked at the Gallery’s Print Room when in 1980 the gallery expanded to occupy No. 5 Great Newport Street and the freehold was purchased.

During Davies' period of tenure the Gallery held some 150 major exhibitions, as well as countless smaller shows. Photographs of Walker Evans, W. Eugene Smith, Florence Henri, William Klein, Imogen Cunningham, Helen Levitt, and hundreds more were among the offerings. Thematic exhibitions included Concerned Photographers 1 (1971), The Press Show (1973), European Colour (1978), and Modern British Photography (1981). Many of the exhibitions traveled throughout England under the auspices of the Arts Council of Great Britain.

Current director of The Photographers Gallery Brett Rogers OBE, notes:

"Sue’s vision for the Gallery was rooted in a spirit of collaboration. From the outset, she gathered a group of like-minded people to work with her to ensure that TPG was first and foremost a place for photographers to exhibit, share, meet and sell their work. Equally she wanted to offer an environment to inspire, educate and inform audiences about the pivotal - and unique - role photography plays in our lives and communities."

In 1991 Davies retired from The Photographers' Gallery, which was still plagued by funding issues due partly to changes to London boroughs funding. She was replaced by Sue Grayson Ford, previously Director of the Serpentine Gallery, and continued to be involved in photography as a visiting lecturer and curator.

Death

Davies died after a long illness on 18 April 2020, four days after her 87th birthday, and in the year before the 50th anniversary of The Photographers' Gallery.

Awards

• 1982 Royal Photographic Society Progress Medal and Honorary Fellowship
• 1988 OBE in the Queen’s birthday honours