Like an old photograph, the name Olive Edis had faded from memory. Yet photographers such as Rankin consider her a trailblazer in a field dominated by men and one of the 20th century’s most important photographers. Cromer Museum holds the world’s largest collection of her work and the ‘Fishermen and Kings’ Gallery is dedicated to the life and work of this pioneering woman.
Her sensitive use of natural light and shadow created strikingly contemporary portraits, revealing glimpses of the sitter’s inner essence. A female business founder, her innovative technical skills were entirely self-taught and included introducing colour autochrome portraits viewed through a diascope made to her own patented design.
Beginning in 1903, her work captured people from many walks of life, from Norfolk fishermen to kings, authors, poets, soldiers and politicians. Famous sitters included George Bernard Shaw, Thomas Hardy, David Lloyd George and Emmeline Pankhurst. She was also the first British woman appointed as an official war photographer, documenting the ravaged landscapes of the Western Front and women’s war work from nursing on hospital ships to manual labour in engine repair shops. Often working in difficult conditions, her journal, on display in Cromer, notes “One soon forgets the tiredness and the discomfort but not the wonderful things one has seen.”
And there’s plenty more to explore at this award-wining museum. From a Victorian fisherman’s cottage right back to fossils like the astonishing West Runton mammoth, varied galleries tell the story of Norfolk’s ever-changing coastal history.
