Early cinema as photographic history: audience and theatrical space in colonial Bombay 1910–1915.
This paper starts from a single archival photograph as a gateway into the historiography of early cinema and its theatrical milieu in colonial Bombay. While a photograph provides only a fleeting glimpse into a now-vanished world, I use it as a fulcrum to construct a broader social and cultural histo...
| Publicado en: | Early Popular Visual Culture Vol. 23; no. 1/2; pp. 100 - 126 |
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| Formato: | Artículo |
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Taylor & Francis Ltd
Feb-May2025
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| Acceso en línea: | Ver este registro en EBSCOhost |
| fields | @attributes: recordID: 1 pdfLink: plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=hlh&AN=186345686&site=ehost-live header: @attributes: shortDbName: hlh uiTerm: 186345686 longDbName: Humanities International Complete uiTag: AN controlInfo: bkinfo: jinfo: jid: 17460654 15UY jtl: Early Popular Visual Culture issn: 17460654 maglogo: N pubinfo: dt: Feb-May2025 vid: 23 iid: 1/2 pid: 377 pub: Taylor & Francis Ltd artinfo: ui: 186345686 10.1080/17460654.2025.2473369 ppf: 100 ppct: 26 formats: fmt: – @attributes: type: T – @attributes: type: P size: 19.9MB tig: atl: Early cinema as photographic history: audience and theatrical space in colonial Bombay 1910–1915. aug: au: Hughes, Stephen Putnam affil: School of Anthropology & Museum Ethnography, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK su: Motion picture audiences Spectators British occupation of India, 1765-1947 Silent films Auditoriums Historical analysis History of photography Image analysis Mumbai (India) sug: subj: Mumbai (India) Motion picture audiences Spectators British occupation of India, 1765-1947 Silent films Auditoriums Historical analysis History of photography Image analysis keyword: audience history Cinema history history of photography Mumbai India theater history visual studies ab: This paper starts from a single archival photograph as a gateway into the historiography of early cinema and its theatrical milieu in colonial Bombay. While a photograph provides only a fleeting glimpse into a now-vanished world, I use it as a fulcrum to construct a broader social and cultural history. My argument unfolds on multiple levels. First, I build a case for why we can be confident that the photograph (though lacking explanatory metadata) depicts an audience within the Royal Opera House in Bombay, dating roughly between 1911 and 1913. Second, this paper serves as a methodological exploration, illustrating how historical inquiry into early cinema can productively use visual analysis along with careful triangulation with other sources. Finally, I advocate for the analytical value of visible evidence in audience studies, demonstrating how photographs can be more than illustrative adjuncts to offer insights into historical spectatorship. Overall, I offer a visual analysis of this image as a piece of cinema history that is a balance between understanding the immediate, surface-level content of an image and its wider social and cultural contexts. pubtype: Academic Journal doctype: Article src: R language: English refInfo: copyright: @attributes: flag: Y custom: Copyright of Early Popular Visual Culture is the property of Taylor & Francis Ltd and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites without the copyright holder's express written permission. Additionally, content may not be used with any artificial intelligence tools or machine learning technologies. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. item: Early Popular Visual Culture holder: Taylor & Francis Ltd dt: @attributes: year: 2025 holdings: @attributes: islocal: N |
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