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| Jhelum Bank by Lady Mary Georgiana Caroline Cecil Filmer, an early proponent of the art of photographic collage. Via: Harvard Art Museums. Possibly date: between 1862-1888. |
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Jhelum by Mary Georgina Filmer
View-Master Kashmir, 1952
An interesting addition to the archive.
A View-Master Reel of Kashmir from 1952. There are seven images (14 for 3d effect) shot on full color Kodachrome film.
Right now, I don’t have the viewer for it so spent the day hacking up a basic viewer out of a card box.
The result….an experiment in color and sound.
Update: 16th Jan 2014
Finally got a viewer.
Flute Player, 1922
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| Kashmiri Pundit Playing the Flute Every Note in Kashmiri Music is overlaid with Grave Notes, to give brilliance to the performance Photograph by Pandit Vishinath Kampassi |
“The melodies belonging to the lakes and rivers are of course unlike those of the mountains. Never shall I forget the charm of being paddled in our shikara, one beautiful moonlight night on the Dal Lake in Kashmir, with our crew singing softly a well-known boatman’s song punctuated by the rhythemic stroke of the paddles. An equally idyllic memory springs to my mind of the fine forests on the mountainous sides of the Lolab valley, and, seated beneath the shade of a lofty pine, a slender stripling playing plaintively upon his simple wooden flageolet. This mournful melody was called “The Parrot” and its theme was a tale of a lady taken captive to Kashmir, who released her favourite parrot to carry a chenar leaf in its beak as a message to her lover. “
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| “Shikara” on the Dal Lake with Kashmiri Fluting A Shikara Ride on the Dal Lake, on a Beautiful Moonlight Night, with the Crew Singling Softly a Boatman’s Song Punctuated by the Rhythmic Stroke of the Paddles, Leaves an Idyllic Memory Photograph by Pandit Vishinath Kampassi |
From ‘Asia : journal of the American Asiatic Association (Volume v.22, November 1922)’, ‘Echoes of Himalayan Flutes’ by Muriel Percy Brown (1874-1943), daughter of Sir Adelbert Talbot, Resident of Kashmir from 1896 to 1900, and wife of art historian Percy Brown. She is more famous for here book, ‘Chenar Leaves: Poems of Kashmir’ (1921)
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Child’s Play: Child Marriages
Kings, Queens, Poets, Muses and Commons. They all were married as a child.
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| “The Boy on the horse is a Bridegroom off for his wedding to a girl nine years old. He looked scared to death as we passed.” |
Photograph: ‘Random Ramblings in India’ (1928) by William H. Danforth.
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| Kashmiri Pandit Child marriage (probably) 1920s |
Photograph: ‘Fifty years against the stream: The story of a school in Kashmir, 1880-1930’ by E.D. Tyndale-Biscoe
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| “The young Kashmir girl in her best clothes, standing besides her grandfather, was being prepared for her betrothal. They wait in one of Srinagar’s narrow alleys” |
Photograph: ‘Of Sea and Land’ (1945) by Tom Lakeman
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My grandmother was well on way to becoming an exception. Kashmir was changing. She was studying in fifth standard. Her father was a teacher. But she too was married at the age of around fourteen to a man recently out of his teens. The tribal attack of 1947 made people anxious and girls were married off in a hurry. Her education was complete.
She taught me how to spell ‘धन्यवाद’.
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Kadal, 1946
Fateh Kadal
1946
From a private album probably belonging to a British Soldier
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Also from the same set: Golf Caddies, Gulmarg, 1946
Golf Caddies, Gulmarg, 1946
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| Golf Caddies, Gulmarg, August 1946 From a private album probably belonging to a British Soldier |
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“On this same afternoon a few boys were posted on the greens to prevent leaves from obscuring golf balls. They swept with a tiny broom made of a few twigs lashed together.
Ghulam, who has been working at this club since 1929, played in Indian tournaments in the 1930’s.
“In my time I played very good golf,” he says, noting that he now has a 3 handicap. Before World War II he met “the top class of golfers” from the British Commonwealth, but now he cannot remember their names.
The 70-year-old Kashmir Golf Club caters to some of the world’s wealthiest tourists, but by American standards the club is impoverished.
The locker room is shabby and smell. The furniture is crude and ancient. Light bulbs are no more than 40 watts in brightness. The 19th hole is a collection of a few rickety table and rattan chairs. The bar is stocked with only a trifling quality of liquor, and all the bottled are dusty.”
Extract from “Playing Golf in Kashmir: Greens Fee is 81 cents and sheep trim fairways” by John S. Radosta for The New York Times, December 7, 1969
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Chilla-Kalan, 1897
‘Kashmir Snow’. 1897.
“Here in Kashmir we call the winter the time of Three Sisters – Forty Days’ Death, and Twenty, and then Ten.”
~ Kingfishers Catch Fire (1953) by Rumer Godden.
Wood and Sand
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| Wood Movers 1950s. |
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| Sand Movers. March 2013 From my father’s camera. |
Bumzu cave temple, 1902
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| Bumzu cave Temple, Bhawan 1902 |
“The following day was spent in exploring the Bawan caves and the massive temple ruins of Martand.
The first cave I entered with much inward trepidation lest our touchwood torches should go out or loose stones be showered on us from the roof. We were shown the recess where a devotee of old lived his strange life and left his bones. A few yards beyond this further progress, except by crawling, was stopped by a recent fall of stones, and so we sought the entrance and made our way to the last and largest cave, which contains what is, perhaps, the very earliest Kashmiri temple. The porch has been cut out of the solid rock, and thence a gloomy passage leads to a flight of steps ascending to the little temple itself. A climb up the hill bought us to the plateau where the grand ruins of Martand stand sentinel, as they have done through countless ages. “
~ Photograph and text: ‘A walking tour in Kashmir by Miss. A.V. Stewart. Nursing sister in the Indian Army.’ For ‘World Wide Magazine. Volume 10. 1902.
Kashmiri Papermaking Photos, 1917
During Mughal time Kashmir was considered the place that produced the finest paper in India. Bud Shah is attributed for brining the art of paper making and book binding into Kashmir from Samarqand. The art survived during Afghan time. But by 20th century it was already in a state of decline. In 1917, Mr. William Raitt, f.s.c, Consulting Cellulose Expert attached to the Forest Research Institute, Dhera Dun, U. P., came in Srinagar at the request of the Kashmir Durbar, to give advice in regard to the improvement of the paper industry. He took about 26 photograph during his visit detailing the entire process of paper making. He later published them in 1939 under the title ‘Kashmiri Papermaking Photos’.
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| Kashmiri ‘Rag’ Paper Maker “The pulp is mixed with water and placed on a framed porous screen. The water drains away leaving the paper which is then pressed and dried. This method of paper-making was also used in Europe until the end of the 18th century, when machines for making continuous rolls of paper were introduced. Wood pulp and cellulose have largely been used in paper manufacture since the 19th century, but plant fibres and rags are also still used, as well as recycled paper.” |
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| Paper Factory |
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| Make Paper |
Check entire set of photographs of the process at: scienceandsociety.co.uk]
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