15th Mar, 2019 10:30 GMT/BST

Books, Maps & Ephemera

 
Lot 125
 

125

Japan and China An album of portrait, landscape, street scenes and other photographs, early...

Japan and China
An album of portrait, landscape, street scenes and other photographs, early 1930s (lists "Peiping", only named such in 1928). Oblong 4to, 37 leaves of card, mounted both sides with photographs with typewritten captions, between boards, bound with ties. First eight and recto of ninth leaf of Japan, rest of China.
Though some of the photographs display typical tourist interest (the Shinkyo Bridge at Nikko and the Great Wall) many others display an interest not in the culture as it was, but as it was becoming. Many of the Chinese shots in particular contrast traditional work in the fields with the modern medical training at Cheeloo University. The photographer shows a particular interest in public health work, with pictures of a dispensary, hospital and first aid poster amongst the rural inns and haystacks built up trees. The photographer shows an impressive freedom of movement around China, given the restrictions on foreign travel at the time.

Whilst there is an underlying Western influence to the photographs, with the expected Christian locations and groups, the album does not exclude traditional forms and locations - even as it accidentally records the steady erosion of such under the new Chinese government (with its memorials to Sun Yat Sen and Revolutionary Martyrs). Intriguingly, for all that the Chinese photographs show an eye to the future, the Japanese ones are born of older cultural images, with temple dancers, tea house staff, and monks amongst the Buddhist temples and pagodas.

Sold for £950
Estimated at £400 - £500


 

. Most pictures bright and clean, with little spotting, fading or other signs of age.

 


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Auction: Books, Maps & Ephemera, 15th Mar, 2019

Books, Maps & Ephemera

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