Paul Foelsche was the Northern Territory's first police inspector. While he held that position from the 1870s to the 1890s, he also chronicled the township of Darwin and its people with a unique series of photos.

His images allow us to see the township of early Darwin, and the developments of the first railway and mine sites. He took beautifully composed pictures of the landscape, and his sensitive portraits of more than 250 individuals of Larakiah, Woolna (Djerimanga), Iwaidja and related peoples offer a remarkable insight into the lives disrupted by colonial endeavour.

The Policeman's Eye: Paul Foelsche's Photography and Ethnography draws on the collection of the South Australian Museum and other Australian archives and libraries to present the first comprehensive study of Foelsche's photographic and ethnographic works. This exhibition casts a new light on the northern Australian frontier, and claims a place for Foelsche in Australian photographic history.