Pilgrimage: Hurley in the Middle East

Pilgrimage: Hurley in the Middle East explores a previously unexamined body of work from lifelong adventurer and documentarian Frank Hurley.

As one of the official Australian Imperial Force (AIF) photographers involved in the First World War, he reprised his role with the Second AIF during the Second World War, travelling around the Middle East and North Africa. His official mission while in the Middle East was to record Australian service members during the desert campaign of the Second World War, but Hurley was entranced by the local cultures, architecture and landscape and soon turned his lens towards them.

This Collections-In-Focus exhibition captures the remarkable landscape and cultures of the area and Hurley’s deep passion for that part of the world. Drawing on the Library’s extensive holdings of Frank Hurley material it features photographs, along with his diaries, writings, passport, guidebooks, map and other travel paraphernalia.