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Views and scenes of China
2006.R.1
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Contributing Institution: Special Collections
Title: Views and scenes of China
Creator: Li, Hongzhang, 1823-1901
Creator: Champion, Paul, 1838-after 1877
Creator: Watson, James Crombie, Major, 1833-1908
Creator: Lai, Fong, approximately 1839-1890
Creator: Liang, Shitai
Creator: Kung, Tai
Creator: Pow Kee Studio
Identifier/Call Number: 2006.R.1
Physical Description: 2 Linear Feet1 box (22 photographic prints)
Date (inclusive): 1860-1900
Physical Location: Request access to the physical materials described in this inventory through the
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Abstract: This group of 22 albumen prints of China includes nine images from Shanghai, four from Hankou, three from Tianjin, two from
Guangzhou, two from Hong Kong, and one each from Anting, Ningbo, Xiamen, Beijing, and Nanjing. Included are photographs made
by British military personnel and other European photographers, as well as Chinese photographers and studios. Photographers
include Paul Champion, St. Julian Hugh Edwards, Lai Fong, Liang Shitai, Kung Tai, Pow Kee Studio, and Major James Crombie
Watson.
Language of Material: English.
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Library Reproductions and Permissions .
Views and scenes of China, 1860-1900, The Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles, Accession no. 2006.R.1.
http://hdl.handle.net/10020/cifa2006r1
Arranged in a single series:Series I: Views and scenes of China, 1860-1900.
Immediate Source of Acquisition
Acquired in 2006.
Scope and Content of Collection
This group of 22 albumen prints of China includes nine images from Shanghai, four from Hankou, three from Tianjin, two from
Guangzhou, two from Hong Kong, and one each from Anting, Ningbo, Xiamen, Beijing, and Nanjing. Included are photographs made
by British military personnel and other European photographers, as well as Chinese photographers and studios. Several of the
photographs capture aspects of the European presence in China in the nineteenth century.
Photographs from Shanghai include two taken by a Lieutenant Colonel E. Milsom in 1868: one is a view of the tea house near
the City God temple (Cheng huang miao); the other is a view of a Shanghai-area pagoda and temple showing damage sustained
in the Taiping Rebellion. A photograph of the Ting-Wong guardians of the portal, Hong Kong, is by Lai Fong. The remaining
six photographs are by unidentified photographers. A studio photograph depicting a staged "demonstration" of ivory carving
dates between 1860 and 1870, while one of a Shanghai street barber dates to the 1870s. From between 1890 and 1899 there are
two prints (one hand-colored), of the Guangzhou guild compound in the city's International Settlement, and two views of the
water tower in Kiangsu Road, the first high-rise concrete structure in China.
Three photographs taken in Hankou between 1875 and 1880 show tea being packed and shipped for export by a Western trading
company. Also from the Hankou area is a view of a pailou, or commemorative arch, with a city gate in the distance, taken in
the 1860s or 1870s.
A view inside Beijing's Qianmen gate by the French photographer, Paul Champion, dates to 1865.
Picturesque views include the "Lucky Rock" in Xiamen, attributed to St. Julian Hugh Edwards (ca. 1870) and a view of cows
in the former village of Wong Nai Chong near Hong Kong from between 1880 and 1890. A view of a Confucian temple on the Qinhuai
River, Nanjing, was taken by Pow Kee in the 1870s.
The informal (i.e. non-official) portrait of Li Hongzhang, viceroy of Zhili, was made by Liang Shitai in 1879, while two views
of the viceroy's state barges, taken in 1894, are unattributed. The formal group portrait of the Anting taotai, or circuit
intendent, with his mother and two wives, was made by Kung Tai in 1877 or 1878. An image of the militia under the command
of Colonel Cooke, the commander of the Anglo-Chinese force at Ningbo, was taken by Major James Crombie Watson around 1870.
The collection was digitized by the repository in 2021 and the images are available online:
http://hdl.handle.net/10020/2006r1
The collection contains photographs by several makers including Paul Champion, St. Julian Hugh Edwards, Lai Fong, Liang Shitai,
Kung Tai, Pow Kee Studio, and Major James Crombie Watson.
Chemical engineer and amateur photographer Paul Champion (1838-1884), traveled through China from 1865 to 1866 under the auspices
of the Société zoologique d'Acclimatation which sought flora and fauna exchange and other trade opportunities with China.
Champion's stereoviews were published by Charles Gaudin, B.K. Editeur, Paris (A. Block) as the series
Chine & Japon, Asiatic Views, China and
Vues de Chine.
The American photographer, St. Julian Hugh Edwards (1838-1903), was based in Amoy (Xiamen) starting around 1861. He was likely
the first photographer to practice in Taiwan.
Kung Tai (Gong Tai) flourished from the 1870s to 1890s in Shanghai. His studio was noted for its mulit-plate panoramas of
the Shanghai Bund.
Lai Fong (ca.1839 to 1890) operated a photography in Hong Kong from at least 1870, and possibly as early as 1859, and was
known for his portraiture and landscapes. Lai used 'Afong' as his commercial name, and the Afong Studio remained in business
until the 1940s.
Liang Shitai (flourished 1870s and 1880s; also known as See Tay), a Cantonese photographer who began his career as a painter,
specialized in portraits of Qing dynasty officials and elites. He opened a studio in Hong Kong in the early 1870s. By 1876
he had relocated to Shanghai and he then moved to Tianjin in the 1880s. Shitai's photographs incorporate the traditional styles
and aesthetics of Chinese painting and his portraits are compositionally and stylistically linked to the canon of Chinese
Imperial portraiture.
Pow Kee (Bao Ji zhaoxiangguan) established a studio in Hankow by at least 1884. By 1888, the studio had moved to Nanjing.
It was re-established in Shanghai in the 1890s, as Pow Kee & Sons.
Major James Crombie Watson (1833, Tasmania, Australia-1908, Ningbo, China), was an officer in the Anglo-Chinese Artillery.
He moved to Nigbo in 1862 where he worked for the Chinese government as the superintendent of police.
Sources consulted:
Bennett, Terry.
History of Photography in China 1842–1860. London: Bernard Quaritch, 2009.
Bennett, Terry.
History of Photography in China: Chinese Photographers 1844–1879. London: Bernard Quaritch, 2013.
Bickers, Robert. Historical Photographs of China. https://www.hpcbristol.net
Bradbury, Joyce.
Forgiven but Not Forgotten: Memoirs of a Teenage Girl Prisoner of the Japanese in China. New South Wales Australia: Jopyce Bradbury, 2000. http://www.weihsien-paintings.org/books/ForgivenForgotten/Book/ch2.htm
Cody, Jeffery W.; Terpak, Frances, eds.
Brush & Shutter: Early Photography in China. Los Angeles: Getty Research Institute, 2011.
Subjects and Indexing Terms
Architecture -- China -- Ming-Ch'ing Dynasties, 1368-1912
City walls -- China
Guilds -- China
Pagodas -- China
Buddhist temples -- China
Guangzhou (China) -- Description and travel
Hankou (Wuhan, China) -- Description and travel
Hong Kong -- Description and travel
Nanjing Shi (China) -- Description and travel
Ningbo Shi (China) -- Description and travel
Shanghai (China) -- Description and travel
Tianjin (China)--Description and travel
Xiamen (Xiamen Shi, China) -- Description and travel
Albumen prints -- China -- 19th century
Group portraits -- China -- 19th century
Studio portraits -- China -- 19th century
Photographs, Original.