Tony Mott

As of 2015 a large percentage of Mott's income comes from stills on television and film productions. This has coincided with the advent of digital photography and other changes in the music industry including a decline in live music and drop in music magazine production.

A retrospective of Tony Mott's work from the last 30 years coinciding with the State Library of NSW exhibition: "What a Life! Rock Photography By Tony Mott" (17 October 2015 – 7 February 2016).

Mott's introduction to film came as a stills photographer with Paul Goldman's feature film Suburban Mayhem (2007). A number of films have followed.

In 2006 whilst employed as stills photographer on the feature film Suburban Mayhem, he met production manager Libby Sharpe, whom he married in 2008. They have two children, twins Harvey and Lucinda, born in 2011.

The advent of digital technology has seen a decline in the demand for rock 'n roll photographs as fans at venues have their own digital cameras and mobile phones. Mott sold 28 images internationally of band Red Hot Chili Peppers when he photographed them in 2000, compared to selling only three images in 2013. Mott finally switched to a digital camera in 2008 after Nikon presented him with a D3 camera. After using it at a Judas Priest concert, he discovered it was well suited to live music, achieving dozens of good images, where film may have produced only a few.

A major breakthrough for Mott came in 1992 with the establishment of Australia's first Rock 'n Roll Festival, the Big Day Out. Each year Mott went on the road as the Festival toured Australia. Developing relationships with the bands he shot, he became the festival's official photographer.

Mott's success is reflected in the number of magazine covers featuring his photographs. Since his first cover for the German issue of Rolling Stone magazine in the early 1990s, his work has been featured on the cover of Rolling Stone 14 times. His photographs have appeared on an estimated 900 magazine front covers.

From the 1990s Mott's photographs were also featured on album covers. Notable early covers included Tommy Emmanuel's Dare to Be Different and the Beasts of Bourbon's Black Milk.

Mott's first international portrait featured the Eurythmics. Then in 1988 Mick Jagger was touring Australia to promote his first solo album and Mott was hired as Jagger's tour photographer. This subsequently led to Mott being hired by the Rolling Stones and touring with them on three occasions. In the same year that Mott was hired by Jagger, he toured with Bob Dylan and Fleetwood Mac, establishing an international reputation. Mott has photographed a large number of the international acts to have visited Australia.

Mott's career as a rock photographer began in 1983 at the Piccadilly Hotel in Kings Cross. Mott went to see the Sydney band the Divinyls on Monday nights at the hotel and began photographing the band's lead singer Chrissy Amphlett. Band manager Vince Lovegrove chose one of Mott's photographs as a tour poster and from 1983 bands began approaching Mott to shoot their gigs. Mott went on to document the Sydney music scene of the 1980s and 1990s when the city and suburbs were full of live venues and had a flourishing record industry.

Mott's portraits have become the best known images of many musicians and bands; examples include Chrissy Amplett of the Divinyls at the Piccadilly Hotel, Kings Cross, 1983; the classic shot of Peter Garrett at the Sydney Entertainment Centre in 1985; the much published portrait of Icelandic singer Björk at the Big Day Out, 1994; the defining shot of Sex Pistols singer Johnny Rotten (Lydon) at the Hordern Pavilion, Sydney, 1994; and the dynamic portraits of Kylie Minogue and Nick Cave who sang the duet "Where the Wild Roses Grow", 1996.

Mott then worked as a chef aboard the cruise ship SS Oriana for two years, visiting more than 60 countries and developing an interest in travel and photography. Returning to Sydney, he decided to settle in Australia permanently in 1981. Whilst resuming work as a chef at the Gazebo Hotel in Kings Cross, Mott pursued his love of music, exploring Sydney's live music scene in the evenings.

At the height of Mott's career he was estimated to have 172 music magazines on his books, and could sell one concert photograph to 30 magazines at a time. Today 162 of those magazine titles no longer exist. These trends mirror changes in the record industry, which in Sydney had 12 major labels in the early 1980s, down to about three in 2015. The shrinking magazine market has seen Mott's income from this source shrink to an estimated 10%, with 10% from record companies, and the rest from band commissions.

Music festivals were another fertile source of photographs for Mott from the late 1980s. Initially he visited the summer festivals in Europe and the United States. Milton Keynes, Reading, and Glastonbury were among the popular UK festivals.

He worked for six months as a chef in Sydney at the Opera House and at the Gazebo Hotel in Kings Cross in 1976, before helping establish a restaurant in Armidale, New South Wales. Mott then returned to England because of a limited working visa.

Collaboration with author Alison Stieven-Taylor profiling rock 'n' roll women from the 1960s onwards, from Janis Joplin, Suzi Quattro and Chrissie Hynde to Courtney Love and Pink.

Tony Mott (born Anthony Moulds, April 1956) is an English-born Australian rock and music photographer. In a career spanning more than 30 years, his photographs have appeared in local and international magazines, newspapers, and album covers. Mott is recognised as Australia's premier rock photographer and a leading worldwide exponent of the craft.

Mott was born Anthony Moulds in April 1956, child of Brian and Mary Moulds, and raised in Sheffield, England. He was a student at Jordanthorpre Comprehensive secondary school, and trained as a chef at Sheffield Polytechnic before arriving in Australia in 1976.