A stunning collection of vintage studio photographs from Egypt,
including princes, pashas, and members of the now vanished ruling class,
presented in a sumptuous edition
From the invention of the camera, photographers, like painters, have
sought to portray other people, and early studio photographs, with their
highly stylized props, poses, and costumes, offer a beguiling window
onto the prevailing fashions, tastes, and attitudes of their time. The
portraits in this book, Egyptian studio photos from the mid-nineteenth
century to the Second World War, tell such a story, their popularity and
art then driven by the burgeoning presence of photo studios across the
country. In their rich variety, they offer vivid evidence of the
democratization of the image as access to the technology spread from
members of Egypt's royalty to an ever-wider circle of subjects. But,
more than that, they freeze time, by capturing human subjects that are
no longer there. These portraits, and the studios that created them,
evoke haunting fragments of a vanished past and invite us to endless
speculation and contemplation. In the age of the selfie, their power to
speak to us from the mists of time cannot be overstated. Includes over
200 stunning images, from the work of 81 photographic studios.
