Power and Resistance
Subtitle
The Delhi Coronation Durbars
Edited by Julie Codell
Features vital photographs that were commissioned from the foremost British and Indian photographers such as Raja Deen Dayal & Sons, Vernon & Co., and Bourne & Shepherd, as well as those shot by amateur photographers. Focuses on photographs made for those who attended the Delhi Durbars and for a global audience who did not attend. The essays focus on semiotics of image and the role of Durbar photographs in visually rendering the complexities of colonial logic. The Durbars were occasions marking the formal coronations of English monarchs as empress and emperors of India: Victoria in 1877, Edward VII in 1903 and George V in 1911. Instituted by the Viceroys of India — Lytton, Curzon and Hardinge — the Durbars were the first examples of the inscription of the Raj in a celebratory history that served to legitimize colonial presence. Lasting several weeks, each lavish occasion was imaged and described in photographs (cartes-de-visite as well as private, popular and commissioned photos), paintings, press illustrations, illustrated souvenirs, memoirs, photo albums and films.
Bio
Julie Codell is an art history professor and affiliate in film and Asian studies at ASU. She wrote "The Victorian Artist" and edited "Transculturation in British Art;" "Power and Resistance;" "Political Economy of Art;" "Genre, Gender, Race, & World Cinema;" and "Imperial Co-Histories." She also co-edited several other works.
