Souvenir album from 1898 of platinum photoprints, or platinotypes, by J.E. Middlebrook, documenting South African cities and towns at the turn-of-the-century.

Late 19th-century South African photographer. The flourishing diamond mines in Kimberley brought hundreds of workers and photographers to the area beginning in 1867. J.E. Middlebrook followed soon thereafter in the early 1870s, and set up his photography studio, The Premier Studio, on West Street West ; he had a second studio in Durban, "Opposite the Club." Middlebrook photographed the landscape, farms, cities, and people of South Africa. His photographs of the Zulu people are considered to be theatrical, deliberating portraying the native people in an idyllic, romantic, and exotic light.

1 album ([26] leaves) : 52 platinum photoprints ; 20 x 26 cm (album)

Title, photographer, and place of publication from upper cover.

Edition statement from Middlebrook's introduction preceding photographs.

Photographs are mounted on rectos and versos of leaves of stiff white card stock, with some foxing on most leaves; interleaved with leaves of glassine; printed caption below each photo.

Bound in remnants of original grained roan morocco padded leather covers, with gold-stamped title "South African Souvenir" on upper cover; inner gilt dentelles; all edges gilt; blue, gold, and brown marbled endpapers.

Spec. Coll. copy: date, Dec. 23, 1898, added in pencil in upper margin of Middlebrook's introduction to the second ed. Last two photographs dated in pencil Jan. 28, 1899 and June 11, 1898 respectively. In modern beige cloth clamshell box.

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