There's hope for me yet...



In the studio, Yva functioned like a movie director. The assistants set up the shots but she took the photographs. One of my jobs was to summon Frau Yva when preparations were complete. It was a very formal process. When the assistants gave me the word, I would run down the massive corridor, knock on her office door, and say, “Frau Yva, we are ready for you.”

She’d follow me to the studio, look through the lens, and say, “Change this, change that, then call me when it’s ready," and return to her office. After the adjustments were made, I ran and knocked on her door again. Yva would check the shot, then squeeze the rubber ball, which is how you operated the shutter on the large studio cameras. Then the first assistant would turn the plate around, and she’d squeeze the ball again.

Apprentices had to learn to do everything. I learned how to print and how to retouch a negative. I also learned how to develop film.
The negatives were very big plate films, 18 x 24 cm, that went into stainless-steel hangers suspended in great big development tanks. It was one of my jobs to mix the developer every Monday morning.

It was not ready-made in a can, like we have today, but all the chemicals were delivered in big brown bags and had to be weighed and properly mixed in hot water. It stank like hell. It was quite an intricate process to mix the developer for the week and to replenish it as well.

That first summer we were photographing in the studio under very hot lights, shooting a catalogue for a fur company. Just like today, all the winter clothes were photographed in the middle of summer. After the session, I had at least 50 negatives to develop.

I went into the darkroom and started processing these big plates. Just above the developing tank were the light switches. There was a red light for orthochromatic films, and there was a regular white-light switch. I was dripping with sweat. There was no air-conditioning, no ventilation. I opened the big tank that held the films on the hangers, took them out to check them, and switched on what I thought was the red light. I hit the white light instead. I quickly shoved everything back into the tank and slammed the lid show, but I knew it was too late. I was so petrified I didn’t say anything.

At the end of the day, Yva said, “Helmut, let me look at the negatives you processed this afternoon.” I went with her, shivering and shaking like a leaf. I followed her into the darkroom, where the hangers were now suspended in the wash tank. She pulled them out one after another and held them up to the light. They were all fogged. She looked at me and said, “Mein Gott im Himmel! What happened, Helmut?” I don’t know, I don’t know.” I lied. “Frau Yva, it’s not my fault. Maybe the plate holders leaked light.” Of course she knew jolly well it was me who had fogged the negatives, but she didn’t say anything else.

Years later, in Melbourne, June and I had a little darkroom that we referred to as “Little Hell” which was just for developing films. I had an assistant, a young boy who was just as green as I was when I was an assistant for Yva.

His job was to load the plate holders for my Graflex. Anyway, he loaded plate holders and I went out to photograph some swimsuits on St. Kilda Beach with my 4 X 5 Graflex Super D. I still have it to this day, it’s a truly wonderful camera. Anyway, I go out onto St. Kilda Beach, take the photographs, and come back. I say to my assistant, “Here, develop these.” So he develops them and he calls me and he says, “Helmut, what’s happened? There are handbags on the film.” I replied, “Handbags?” and he said, “Yes, handbags!”

The week before, we had done a handbag catalogue, and there were still some old negatives lying around in the darkroom. This boy, instead of loading fresh film into my plate holders, had loaded the old exposed negatives from the catalogue from the week before. My bathing suits were all photographed onto the old negatives with the bloody handbags on them! So I guess that’s a story that must happen to every photographer.