© Barry Cheeseman 2015

BARRY CHEESEMAN

Barry’s passion for photography developed late in life. With a career spanning twenty seven years in accounting and financial institutional management, it wasn’t until 1998 that he finally immersed himself in the art of photography.

After attending courses at TAFE and the Brisbane College of Photography and Art, his passion grew and he registered the business  “Mystique Of Images”  in 2001. He became a member of the Australian Institute of Professional Photographers (AIPP), and opened a photographic studio in South Brisbane in the same year. He then moved the studio to West End, Brisbane where he continued to offer his services until mid 2007.

In Sept 2007 he and his wife travelled to Vietnam. To Barry, this was a return visit after 39 years, for he had served as a National Serviceman with the Australian Infantry in Vietnam during 1968-69. Resulting from the 2007 visit, Barry then developed and accompanied photographers’ tours to Vietnam from April 2008 to mid 2014. Over 20 tours were conducted with Barry doing several additional solo tours (accompanied by his Vietnamese good friend and guide, Nguyen)) through the most northern areas of Vietnam on the border with China.

Barry visited and continues to support a school of primary children located at Ban Khoang in the far northern region of Vietnam.

In 2009 Barry published his first book “Portraits of Vietnam”, a copy of which was sent to Vu Hong Nam, at that time the Vietnamese Consul General in Australia.  As Nam felt the book was such a true representation and study of the Vietnamese people, a friendship developed which led to meetings with Vietnam government officials, the directors of the government printing company and several leading Vietnamese artists and photographers.

Barry in 2014 published “Portraits of Vietnam - Book 2”  in both electronic and printed book form. The ebook is available through Apple iBook store for download to iPad, iPhone, iPod touch and Mac computers.

Throughout Barry’s association with photography, he has gained national and international recognition for his portraits and conducted solo exhibitions of his works in galleries within Queensland, Australia. He has served in executive positions at many photography clubs together with the Photographic Society of Queensland (PSQ). He has lectured at conferences, private photography schools as well as camera clubs. He is an accredited judge of photography with the Photographic Society of Queensland (PSQ).

In 2015 Barry and his wife returned to Hoi An, Vietnam, for a month, to complete the photography of yet another book. This time the book is on the Hoi An region, with the foreword written by Vu Hong Nam, former Consul General of Vietnam in Australia.