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Payne (Oskar Birkett) views of China
2004.R.2
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Title: Oscar Birkett Payne Views of China
Date (inclusive): circa 1924-circa 1929
Number: 2004.R.2
Creator/Collector:
Payne, Oscar Birkett
Physical Description:
14 Linear Feet
(24 boxes)
Repository:
The Getty Research Institute
Special Collections
1200 Getty Center Drive, Suite 1100
Los Angeles 90049-1688
reference@getty.edu
URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10020/askref
(310) 440-7390
Abstract: The collection of glass and nitrate
negatives contains almost 1,000 views of Shanghai and surrounding areas taken by Oscar
Birkett Payne, especially documenting sites and scenes along the waterways going as far
north as Ningbo (Ningpo) and Hangzhou (Hangchow). The geographical area represented
comprises the provinces of Jiangsu (Kiangsu) and Zhejiang (Chekiang), and includes the towns
or districts of Anting (Anking), Nanxiang (Nanshiang), Suzhou (Soochow), Songjiang
(Sungkiang), Haining, Hangzhou, Jiaxing (Kashing), and Ningbo, as well as the city of
Shanghai.
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Language: Collection material is in English
Oscar Birkett Payne was an English designer, decorator and furniture designer. He was born
in Carnforth, Lancashire on 1 November 1886. His father was a Master Decorator who played a
significant role in the decoration of Leighton Hall, Carnforth, which still stands today,
and is open to the public for viewing of its beautiful interiors and furniture, much of
which was made by Waring & Gillow of Lancaster.
Payne was educated at Warwick School, Britain's oldest private boy's school. As a young man
he worked for Waring & Gillow, of Manchester, but his love of the Far East led him to
travel and work in Burma, and for the firms Hall & Holtz and Arts & Crafts in
Shanghai. After World War II he was solicited by the Peninsula Hotel in Hong Kong to oversee
the extensive renovation of the hotel, which he did from approximately 1947 to 1955. Payne's
hobby was photography, which he combined with his extensive travels.
Payne died on 23 June 1957.
Sources cited:
Archivist correspondence with Angeline Thompson, 2 May 2019.
Oscar Birkett Payne was an interior decorator employed by the Shanghai furnishing firm of
Hall, Hotz & Co.
Open for use by qualified reserchers. The nitrate negatives are restricted; copy print
surrogates are to be used instead.
Contact
Library Reproductions and Permissions .
Oscar Birkett Payne Views of China, circa 1924-circa 1929, The Getty Research Institute,
Los Angeles, Accession no. 2004.R.2.
http://hdl.handle.net/10020/cifa2004r2
Immediate Source of Acquisition
Gift of Joan and Clark Worswick.
The collection was processed by Jan Bender and Beth Ann Guynn in 2005. At that time Bender
wrote a preliminary box list. Guynn wrote the finding aid in 2018.
Existence and Location of Copies
Series I., Nitrate negatives, was digitized in 2018 and the images are available
online:
http://hdl.handle.net/10020/2004r2_d387156b428e2b1b2d2468a1d15a747a
Scope and Content of Collection
The collection of glass and nitrate negatives contains almost 1,000 views of Shanghai and
surrounding areas taken by Oscar Birkett Payne, especially documenting sites and scenes
along the waterways going as far north as Ningbo (Ningpo) and Hangzhou (Hangchow). The
geographical area represented comprises the provinces of Jiangsu (Kiangsu) and Zhejiang
(Chekiang), and includes the towns or districts of Anting (Anking), Nanxiang (Nanshiang),
Suzhou (Soochow), Songjiang (Sungkiang), Haining, Hangzhou, Jiaxing (Kashing), and Ningbo,
as well as the city of Shanghai. Views of Shanghai include the old Chinese city as well as
the European commercial center along the river known as the Shanghai Bund. Hebei (Hopei)
province is respresented in a map of Nakow pass and a view of the Great Wall.
Included are views of the countryside, canals and rivers, bridges, junks, city walls,
houses, local agricultural practices, pagodas, temples, Buddhist sculptures, markets, and
cloud studies. The views of temples, pagodas, and their contents are especially valuable to
researchers, as they capture the religious sites at a particular moment in time before many
were destroyed by war or fire during the upheavals of the Chinese revolution in the late
1920s.
There are numerous portraits of Buddhist priests, many holding religious implements such as
ruyi scholar wands and prayer beads. Many of the priests are from the Tiger Hill Pagoda.
Candid and posed portraits of local inhabitants include studies of men, women, children, and
family groups from various walks of life and of various ages. They are shown engaged in a
wide variety of daily activities such as ploughing, weaving, smoking and drinking tea,
selling their wares, and making shoes. Several images include Western men or women; Oscar
Birkett Payne can be identified in a few images.
The collection is arranged in two series:
Series I. Nitrate negatives, circa 1924-circa
1929;
Series
II. Glass negatives, circa 1924-circa 1929.
Long hua si (Shanghai,
China)
Buddhist architecture -- China
Architecture, Domestic -- China
Buddhism -- Liturgical objects -- China
Buddhist monks -- China -- Portraits
City walls -- China
Indigeneous peoples -- China
Junks -- China
Landscapes -- China
Pagodas -- China
Buddhist temples -- China
Great Wall of China (China) -- Description and travel
China -- Description and travel
Hebei Sheng (China) -- Description and travel
Jiangsu Sheng (China) -- Description and travel
Zhejiang Sheng (China) -- Description and travel
Dry collodion negatives -- China -- 20th century
Gelatin silver negatives -- China -- 20th century
Lantern slides -- China -- 20th century
Photographs, Original
Payne, Oscar Birkett