"Victor Trumper" Photograph
Both an amateur cricket player and an amateur photographer, George Beldam, a "man of leisure," extensively photographed athletes in the early 20th century. The above photograph of celebrated cricket player Victor Trumper was featured in CB Fry's 1905 book, Great Batsmen: Their Methods At A Glance. In the following years and even after Trumper's death in 1915, he became one of the most cherished athletes in his home country of Australia, arguably because of the extensive and heavily aestheticized manner in which he was documented by Beldam. In fact, the "style" with which he is attributed can arguably be derived from the photographs that "outlived" him, so to speak.
"Like Trumper, Beldam was an autodidact who pushed boundaries and broke new ground in his best-known medium of self-expression. Just as Trumper redefined the possibilities of batting, Beldam pioneered an entire genre of photography, making a lot of it up as he went along" (Jackson).
