Historical Photographs of China
This blog showcases the work and interests of the University of Bristol’s Historical Photographs of China project. Launched in 2006, and led by Robert Bickers, it aims to locate, digitize and publish online through its open access platform, historical photographs of China mainly in the hands of families who formerly had connections to China. We borrowed collections, made copies and returned the originals. For a variety of reason, these materials form an important surrogate for materials lost during the course of China’s tumultuous twentieth century. They also provide records of its historic built environment, culture, society and politics. The platform currently showcases barely a quarter of the materials that we have digitized, which range in date from 1857 to 1967, but which are mostly concentrated in period 1880s-1930s.
To find about about the project please visit the site. You can also find us on Bluesky, Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, and Sina Weibo, and you can find a short film about the project here, and a BBC Radio 4 programme about us here.
Our funders
Over the course of its history, Historical Photographs of China received support from JISC, the British Academy, through its Academy Research Projects scheme, and from the Arts & Humanities Research Council, through an award to the British Inter-university China Centre, the University of Bristol, and from philanthropic sources.