© 2018 Greg & Sylvia RAY

Miscellaneous

Read more about the article The nudes that started our publishing career

The nudes that started our publishing career

When people ask us how we got started on our career of book publishing I'm never sure whether to tell the truth. Because it all started with some boxes of glass plate negatives of naked women. I'd been at an ephemera fair in Sydney, and a dealer from whom I'd bought a few items suggested I visit his home, where he said he had thousands of collectible items for sale. I made the visit, and found a home full of all manner of second-hand and vintage goods in cabinets, on shelves and in heaps on the…

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Read more about the article The phantom of the Victoria Theatre and other cinema tales
The old Victoria Theatre, now undergoing restoration.

The phantom of the Victoria Theatre and other cinema tales

THE entertainment Max Donnan enjoyed during his long career in Newcastle cinemas wasn’t always on the big screen. Some of it came from the clientele, some came from the quirks and challenges of the various theatres and a little bit came from the ghost. That was the ghost at the old Victoria Theatre in Perkin Street, which rejoiced in Max’s time in the full name “British Victoria Theatre”. The Vic has a treasured place in Max’s memory, but he admits the ghost rattled him more than a little on the two occasions he encountered it. He…

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Read more about the article Nudes, beer and pasta in 1960s Newcastle
Copy of a Goya nude in a Cessnock Hotel, February 1962. Photo by Ron Morrison

Nudes, beer and pasta in 1960s Newcastle

In the 1960s a nude picture on the wall of your pub or restaurant might have caused strife with the authorities: unless of course it was a copy of a nude by an old master, which is a different thing altogether. In a Cessnock pub, for example, a local artist daubed a copy of Goya's Nude Maja for the edification and titillation of Coalfields drinkers. I don't know which pub was so gorgeously adorned, nor the name of the copyist, nor the fate of the copy. Here's a link to the original, so you can judge…

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