A bamboo grove on the North River, Guangdong (Kwangtung) province, China. Photograph by John Thomson, 1870.

Roofs of a building in the left foreground, cultivated fields beyond. Mist obscuring mountains in the distance

This photograph was taken during John Thomson s trip on the North River, a branch of the Pearl River. He was completely struck by what he saw: "The cultivation hereabouts was of a kind I had never seen before; in the foreground were a multitude of fields, banked off for the purposes of irrigation, but already shorn of their crops; here and there was a mound covered with temples and trees, and beyond, reaching to the base of the distant mountains, were groves of green bamboo, rocking their plumage to and fro in the wind, like the waves of an emerald sea." This natural beauty inspired him to compose the photograph to give his readers some idea of "the grandeur of the inland scenery. The vast plain covered with graceful bamboo or the luxurious green of the paddy fields, contrast abruptly with the background . . ."

1870

1 photograph : glass photonegative, wet collodion ; glass approximately 20.5 x 25.5 cm (8 x 10 in.)

Bamboo culture Kwangtung Plain Signed Bears Thomson's negative number: "310"

China through the lens of John Thomson, 1868-1872, Beijing: Beijing World Art Museum, 2009, p. 147 (reproduced)

Paisarn Piemmettawat, Siam through the lens of John Thomson 1865-66, including Angkor and coastal China, Bangkok: River Books, 2015, p. 141

This is one of a collection of original glass negatives made by John Thomson. The negatives, made between 1868 and 1872, were purchased from Thomson by Sir Henry Wellcome in 1921

Wellcome Collection 18878i