Artwork Page for Ispola and Sultan Kheyl Villages

Details / Information for Ispola and Sultan Kheyl Villages

Series Title: Afghanistan, February 1880

Ispola and Sultan Kheyl Villages

1878–80

John Burke

(Irish, 1845–1915)
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Culture
Ireland
Medium
albumen print
Credit Line
Mr. and Mrs. Richard W. Whitehill Art Purchase Endowment Fund 2024.6.t
Public Domain
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Location
Not on view
Print
?

Did You Know?

This album includes some of the earliest photographs of Afghanistan.

Description

The subject of this album is the Second Anglo-Afghan War, which was fought from 1878 to 1880. John Burke was the first photographer to photograph extensively in Afghanistan and the main photographer covering that conflict. The technology of the day did not permit action shots of battles. As is usual for early conflict photography, the pictures are landscapes of the sites of momentous incidents, views of camps and civil and military infrastructure, and portraits of the soldiers and their leaders.
A horizontally oriented albumen print depicts a sepia-toned landscape of a wide valley framed by craggy mountains. In the foreground, low stone walls cross rocky earth. On the center-right, a winding path leads toward a hill topped with a circular stone structure. Sparse trees and scattered buildings dot the valley floor beneath a pale sky. Faint, dark text in the bottom-right corner marks the expanse of the arid scene.

Ispola and Sultan Kheyl Villages

1878–80

John Burke

(Irish, 1845–1915)
Ireland

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