Axel Poignant
Axel Poignant (12 December 1906 – 5 February 1986) was an Australian photographer. Personal life Poignant was born on 12 December 1906 in Leeds, England, to a Swedish father and an English mother. He had a younger sister. He was educated at Grosvenor House School in Harrogate, Yorkshire, and then moved to Sweden at the end of 1918 where he finished the rest of his education. He returned to England in 1925, then emigrated to Sydney, New South Wales, Australia in July 1926 under the Dreadnought Scheme. He travelled from place to place looking for work throughout Sydney and New South Wales. Poignant married Sandra St Lucien Eliot Chase on 21 April 1930 and they moved to Perth, Western Australia, where he specialised in portrait photography, personal events as well as aerial photography for Western Mining. Poignant and Sandra divorced in 1941. Poignant became a citizen of Australia on 8 July 1942 in Perth, and married Ruth Marjorie Pettersen the same month. He enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force the following year; he was discharged in 1945. His second wife died in 1953, and on 24 October 1953 Poignant married Roslyn Betty Izatt, a film technician, in Sydney. He had