Examples of the Earliest Commercial Photography in Manila
Collection of CDVs from the Earliest Commercial Photographers in the Philippines
Publication: [Manila, Philippines]: [1860s–1870s].
Notes: A group of ten carte-de-visite format albumen prints, 1860s to 1870s, showing a variety of inhabitants of the Philippine Islands, ranging from indigenous men and more westernized Filipinos, to Chinese and Spanish immigrants. The first six images bearing imprints on reverse (one hand inscribed and another hand-dated in 1867) for Pedro Picon, Fotógrapho", and others signed "Honiss Fotografo Manila", "Fotographia Universal... Manila", "H. Schuren's... Singapore / Bangkok / Manila" and "W. W. Wood / Manila."
The British photographer Albert Honiss is generally credited with running the first commercial photography studio in the Philippines, in Manila, from about 1865 until his death in 1874. Henri Schüren (Schueren), a German photographer, operated in Manila in the late 1870s. Pedro Picón, about whom little is known, operated a studio in the 1860s specializing in portraits (well represented in this grouping); he is credited with the earliest photograph on paper in the Philippines. William Wood, an American, went to China in the 1820s and then to the Philippines in 1833; a Daguerreotype portrait of him is one of the oldest Philippines photographs. He opened a studio about 1870. Antonio Perello was active in the 1870s under the name Fotografía Universal.
For more on early commercial photography in the Philippines, see The Encyclopedia of Nineteenth Century Photography (South-east Asia entry) and An Early Album of the World, Photographs 1842–1896 edited by Christine Barthe.
Edition + Condition: Some cards with slightly trimmed edges, scratches, pinholes, and the like, but overall, an excellent grouping of rare photographs.
Item No: #362711
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