Tea Cup Ballet: A remarkable use of light

This stunning image by Australian photographer Olive Cotton uses light beautifully. This image was made in 1935. Cotton composed this photo in her studio one day after work using a set of new cheap tea cups.

“Olive Cotton – Tea cup ballet, 1935” by Olive Cotton – Tea cup ballet at the Art Gallery of New South Wales.
Licensed under Public domain via Wikimedia Common [URL]

In the photographers own words:

This picture evolved after I had bought some inexpensive cups and saucers from Woolworths for our studio coffee breaks to replace our rather worn old mugs. The angular handles reminded me of arms akimbo, and that led to the idea of making a photograph to express a dance theme.

When the day’s work was over I tried several arrangements of the cups and saucers to convey this idea, without success, until I used a spotlight and realised how important the shadows were. Using the studio camera, which had a 6 ½ x 4 ½ inch ground glass focusing screen, I moved the cups about until they and their shadows made a ballet-like composition and then photographed them on a cut film negative. The title of the photograph suggested itself.

This was my first photograph to be shown overseas, being exhibited, to my delight, in the London Salon of Photography in 1935

The unique, modern shape of the cups combined with the dramatic lighting and the composition really do give the sense of a ballet. This image by Olive Cotton is a masterpiece of lighting and composition.

Source: “Tea Cup Ballet” (web page), Art Gallery New South Wales,