In Pursuit of a Chameleon: Early Ethnographic Photography from Angola in Context

Abstract

In recent years early photographs from Africa have increasingly attracted the attention of historians and ethnologists, as have those from other parts of the world for some time. It has been attempted to ascertain the general and specific circumstances which led to them being made and subsequently used. The multifarious problems raised by their interpretation have been discussed. Books and articles have been published in which historical photographs form an integral and principal component. And it has been attempted to tap hitherto neglected, or to a large extent unknown, photographic archives and collections.One of the countries to which least attention has been paid in this field is Angola, whose photographic documentation is widely scattered and in some cases not accessible. It is likely that many valuable collections have yet to be discovered; and of those that are known, in most cases the financial means and the expertise necessary for their conservation are lacking. In the light of this generally bleak situation Jill Dias' recent systematic review of the period from 1870 to 1914 is particularly welcome. My own contribution will take her work as its starting point, but will focus exclusively on ethnographic photography.“Ethnography” will be used here in the sense in which photographers and researchers active in Angola during the period concerned (1875-1940) understood it—as a description (more systematic in some cases than in others) of “uncivilized,” “native” African peoples and cultures. It should be remembered that the boundary between “physical” and “cultural” anthropology was at that time still fluid.