BOOK: THE EMPIRE OF VISION: PHOTOGRAPHY IN THE PORTUGUESE COLONIAL CONTEXT (1860-1960)
Between 1860 and 1960 photography was the major way of making the world visible. The hegemony of photography was contemporary with the modern formations of empires. A chronological coincidence that reflected itself in the straight relationship between photography and colonialism. The reproductive potentialities of photography multiplied its uses in the public sphere: in exhibitions, leaflets, postcards, illustrations of books and newspapers. But also in the private and personal sphere. The colonial archives of the present, be them institutional or private, are unstable places, of lived and contradictory memories.
Photography was not a mere illustration of the colonies. Photography created colonial experiences. Recent studies on colonies recognise how, next to written documentation, images are determinant to understand and study the formation of empires. In the intertwined histories of empire and vision that are narrated in this book, some themes emerge as central ones: photography as an inseparable instrument of the many scientific knowledges which used the colonies as their laboratory, from natural history to anthropology and medicine; photography as and affirmation of power – as a proof of possession, in the territorial African explorations which took place, or as proof of violence, during the colonial wars of independence; photography appropriated by the colonial subjects, as well as European anti-colonialists, as a way of resistance, in the forging of national identities or, nowadays, in contemporary artistic practices that work with the past; and photography in its travels within a global space, between its production, circulation and reception in multiple contexts.
With a participation of 30 researchers from different areas and different approaches, and introduction of James R. Ryan, especially in photography in the British imperial experience, this book places the Portuguese experience with the international debates, while being a pioneering study on photography in the Portuguese colonial context.
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