Entertainment Hall Seating

Provenance

Camera: NIKON D7000
Lens: 14.0-24.0 mm f/2.8
Settings: 24mm · f/8.0 · 0.4s · ISO 100
Paper: Ilford Galerie Smooth Cotton Rag 310 gsm

Rows of abandoned seating fill the entertainment hall at White Bay Power Station. The industrial landmark, operational from 1917 to 1983, now stands silent. Dust covers the worn chairs, awaiting a long-gone audience.

Edition

Open edition

Open edition
Printed to order, no fixed quantity. Each print is hand-signed by the photographer.

Limited edition
A fixed number of prints exist. Once sold, the edition closes permanently. Each print is individually numbered and signed.

$100.00 AUD

Colour

Signed, numbered, with COA. Made to order in 10 to 20 business days (framed). Shipped in protective packaging with edition certificate, paper-stock reference and a printed care guide.

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In situ

01 PROVENANCE

Print datasheet

Title: Entertainment Hall Seating
Series: White Bay Power Station
Catalogue: WBP-046
Process: Giclée
Captured: 13 November 2015
Camera: NIKON D7000
Lens: 14.0-24.0 mm f/2.8
Aperture: f/8.0
Shutter: 0.4s s
ISO: 100
Focal length: 24 mm
Paper: Ilford Galerie Smooth Cotton Rag 310 gsm
Paper size: 290 × 200 mm
Location: Rozelle, New South Wales, Australia
Authenticity: C2PA verified provenance →
Recognised by: Highly Commended in Multimedia at the 2016 National Trust of Australia (NSW) Heritage Awards

02 LOCATION

Rozelle, New South Wales, Australia

Map · Mapbox · OpenStreetMap

03 THE STORY

About this print

A long timber bench runs along the wall of the entertainment hall at White Bay Power Station, the seat hardwood and the back fixed to the wall behind. The bench is unbroken across most of the wall length, with a small gap at each side where a doorway opens through the wall. The hardwood has darkened with age and accumulated dust. The cushion that may once have covered the bench is gone; the underlying timber carries the wear pattern of decades of working-shift social use. The wall behind the bench is concrete, painted institutional cream, with a row of timber-framed windows above the bench at eye level.

The entertainment hall at White Bay served the plant's workforce, which peaked at around 500 to 600 people across multiple shifts. The hall held after-shift functions, union meetings, retirement parties, and the regular social events that were a fixture of large industrial workforces in the mid-twentieth century. The bench in this photograph was where workers sat through those events. White Bay closed on Christmas Day 1983 and the hall stopped being used for its original purpose. The site has been opened to the public occasionally since, including for the 2024 Biennale of Sydney.

04 FROM THE FIELD NOTES

The long wooden bench stretches the length of the hall, its weathered planks worn smooth by years of use. Against the stained and crumbling wall, it stands as a quiet witness to the gatherings that once filled this space.

Brett Patman

The series

White Bay Power Station

2015–2018 · 124 photographs

Bricklayers laid 3.7 million bricks at White Bay across three and a quarter years of Phase 1 construction, on Wanngal Country at the western edge of Rozelle. The New South Wales Government Railways ran the build through its own Construction Department. By 3 July 1913, boilers and alternators were running before the buildings that housed them were complete.

View all in this series →

05 SIZE GUIDE

Print sizes

The anatomy view shows what this finish is as a physical object: paper margin, mat band, frame depth, acrylic profile. The comparison strip shows how each size sits relative to the others at true scale. Click a size or a finish to update both.