Robert Whitaker (photographer)

Robert Whitaker (13 November 1939 – 20 September 2011) was a renowned British photographer, best known internationally for his many photographs of The Beatles, taken between 1964 and 1966, and for his photographs of the rock group Cream, which were used in the Martin Sharp-designed collage on the cover of their 1967 LP Disraeli Gears.

Whitaker was born in Harpenden, Hertfordshire, England in 1939, but described himself as "one part Aussie lad" since his father and his grandfather were both Australian. According to Whitaker, his grandfather built the Princes Bridge in Melbourne. Although he has worked mostly in Britain, Australia and Australian connections have featured throughout career.

He began his photographic career in London in the late 1950s but he moved to Melbourne in 1961, where he began studying at the University of Melbourne and became part of the small but flourishing Melbourne arts scene. According to art historian David Mellor, it was Whitaker's three years in Australia that transformed his work as a photographer. A major influence was undoubtedly his friendship with two of the leading figures of the Melbourne art world, art dealer, patron and restaurateur Georges Mora and his wife, the painter Mirka Mora.

Through the Mora family, he came into contact with other major figures in Australian art and letters including John Reed and Sunday Reed, Ian Sime, Charles Blackman and Barbara Blackman, Barrett Reid, Laurence Hope, Arthur Boyd, Sidney Nolan and Joy Hester, as well as his own peer group including Martin Sharp, Richard Neville, Barry Humphries and Germaine Greer. Whitaker photographed many of these people including Georges and Mirka Mora and their three sons, Philippe Mora (a noted film director), William Mora and Tiriel Mora (a prominent Australian actor).

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