'It was not meant to be shown as a grand former empire, but as these crumbling ruins.' What these rare images of 19th-century India tell us about colonial rule and how photography was used as a propaganda tool via CNNStyle
But while the book's images often reflect explicit propaganda efforts , many simply document dominant attitudes of the day.
"I think some of it was conscious, but photographs also reflect the time they were taken in, and the prevailing mindset," he added."I don't think photographers were sitting down with spin doctors saying, 'We need to make it look like this.' But I think, inevitably, that's what happened."Despite the political undertones, colonial India's early cameras were also used for relatively mundane purposes: art, postcards or keepsakes.
"They were replacing drawings as a way of describing monuments, for instance," said Gaskell."And that's why you get these big catalogs of, literally, a whole building, with every stone or detail recorded. It made things much faster than having a whole team of draftsmen."The spread of portrait studios is another important development in photography on the subcontinent -- one that wasn't driven solely by the imperial elite.
"Hand-coloring of photographs is something that also happened in Japan and China," he said."But in India it was a much thicker application of paint that almost completely concealed the image. You'd get gold leaf painted directly on, so there'd be almost none of the original photograph visible.
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