An engineer by training, Cox spent almost three decades working for the British Columbia Department of Public Works. Shortly after taking up photography in 1924, he became an active member of West Coast camera clubs and of the international Pictorialist salons, and his work was included in several solo exhibitions at the Vancouver Art Gallery. His photographs share the Pictorialists’ preference for soft focus and classical nudes, but they are also rigorously designed around Cox’s ideas of “dynamic symmetry.” Most of his photographs remained with his family after his death and his contributions were largely forgotten until a 2003 exhibition at Presentation House Gallery in Vancouver.

Image: H.G. Cox, The Idol Worshippers (Nellie Near and Cora Pasmore), 1928, sepia-toned gelatin silver print.

For further reading, see:

Jeffries, Bill. “Athens on the Fraser: The Photographs of H.G. Cox.” North Vancouver: Presentation House Gallery, 2003. thepolygon.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/2003-H.G.-Cox-brochure.pdf.

Jefferies, Bill, et al. H.G. Cox: British Columbia Pictorialist. North Vancouver: Presentation House Gallery, 2004.