This combination of mapping and closely observed portraiture is typical of imperialist visual culture. Whether painted, photographic, drawn or printed, this genre of portraiture sought to create an objective record of a complex subject. Disturbingly, it often lacked the kind of empathetic identification that is usual in modern portraiture.
Dalziel after Johann Baptist Zwecker, two maps and ‘The Kaffir from Childhood to Age (From Photographic Portraits)’, for J G Wood, The Natural History of Man (London: Routledge, 1868-1870). Dalziel Archive Vol. XXII (1867), British Museum reg. no. 1913,0415.183, print nos. 1-3. By Permission of the Trustees of The British Museum. All Rights Reserved © Sylph Editions, 2016