In the mid-19th century, right around the time when famed American Civil War photographer Mathew Brady established his studio in New York, two English photographers, Walter Woodbury and James Page, were working in what was then the Dutch East Indies. Based in Java, they produced portraits of Indonesia, recorded colonial life, and views from Sumatra to The Moluccas. On October 4 in London, Bonhams will offer six volumes containing 248 of their pioneering images, estimated at $62,300-$78,000.
Woodbury is the earliest known photographer of the Dutch East Indies. After meeting Page in Australia, the two Englishmen planned a photographic voyage around Southeast Asia. They got as far as present day Jakarta, where they discovered opportunity sufficient to establish a studio and began recording these highly regarded images.
Read more at Bonhams.
