Switch House Wall at White Bay Power Station, a narrow walkway runs alongside the White Bay Power Station Switch House.
Switch House Wall at White Bay Power Station, a narrow walkway runs alongside the White Bay Power Station Switch House.

Switch House Wall

Provenance

Camera
NIKON D7000
Lens
14.0-24.0 mm f/2.8
Settings
21mm · f/8.0 · 1/80 · ISO 160
Paper
Ilford Galerie Smooth Cotton Rag 310 gsm

A narrow walkway along the Switch House wall, concrete cable races running its full length. These channels carried the electrical arteries of the distribution system. White Bay and Ultimo Power Station together fed a 6,600 V transmission network serving Sydney's tram and railway sub-stations.

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
Size
Type
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.
See certificate sample →

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In situ

Switch House Wall at White Bay Power Station, a narrow walkway runs alongside the White Bay Power Station Switch House.Switch House Wall at White Bay Power Station, a narrow walkway runs alongside the White Bay Power Station Switch House.Switch House Wall at White Bay Power Station, a narrow walkway runs alongside the White Bay Power Station Switch House.Switch House Wall at White Bay Power Station, a narrow walkway runs alongside the White Bay Power Station Switch House.Switch House Wall at White Bay Power Station, a narrow walkway runs alongside the White Bay Power Station Switch House.
01 PROVENANCE

Print datasheet

Title
Switch House Wall
Series
White Bay Power Station
Catalogue
WBP-070
Process
Giclée
Captured
13 November 2015
Camera
NIKON D7000
Lens
14.0-24.0 mm f/2.8
Aperture
f/8.0
Shutter
1/80 s
ISO
160
Focal length
21 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 wall of switchgear cabinets in the switch house at White Bay Power Station runs along the inside face of the building, each cabinet a tall steel enclosure painted in the pale industrial green of the plant. The cabinets carry hand-painted labels identifying the circuit each one served. Heavy steel doors carry warning signs in fading enamel: HIGH VOLTAGE, KEEP OUT. The floor in front of the cabinets is the rubber matting that insulated the operator's feet from earth potential. Cabling runs overhead in heavy gauge, dead now, the terminations sealed with insulating tape. Daylight comes through high windows along the upper wall.

The switch house at White Bay handled the high-voltage switching that connected the plant's generators to the transmission network. Each cabinet held the disconnect switches, the circuit breakers, and the protective relaying for one of the plant's feeders. The system ran continuously through every operating shift across the plant's working life from 1917 to Christmas Day 1983. After closure, the switchgear was isolated from the network and the cabinets locked shut. The cabinets in this photograph are essentially as they were left, with the rubber matting, the warning signs, and the cabling still in place.

04 FROM THE FIELD NOTES

A narrow walkway runs alongside the White Bay Power Station Switch House, bordered by a row of concrete cable races that once carried the arteries of electrical power. Decades ago, these channels were filled with thick, insulated conductors, directing energy through the heart of the facility. Now, stripped and abandoned, they sit empty, their rigid forms softened only by the slow encroachment of dust and nature.

Brett Patman

White Bay Power Station

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.

Anatomy · true ratio
07 MORE FROM WHITE BAY POWER STATION

123 other prints in this series

All prints
Control Room at White Bay Power Station, a curved control console wraps across the room in a wide arc.
Control Room $100.00
Turbine Hall at White Bay Power Station, reinforced concrete walls rise three storeys on each side, their surfaces stained.
Turbine Hall $100.00
Glass Curtain at White Bay Power Station, a towering mosaic of glass and steel, where light filters through dust-streaked.
Glass Curtain $100.00
Turbine and Condenser at White Bay Power Station, a steam turbine and its condenser sit on the operating floor of White Bay.
Turbine and Condenser $100.00
08 BY POST · NO SPAM

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