Glimpses of an Eclipsed Heritage: Photography of Afghanistan in the Collections of the Fine Arts Library at Harvard

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作   者：

Jeffrey B. Spurr; 

作者机构：

Harvard University;  Fine Arts Library; 

关键词：

art;  fine arts library;  harvard university;  afghanistan;  cultural preservation;  photography;  ethnography;  architecture; 

期刊名称：

Visual resources

i s s n：

0197-3762

年卷期：

2005 年 21 卷 1 期

页   码：

55-71

页   码：

摘   要：

The photographic collections of Harvard's Fine Arts Library have benefited from a recurring interest in augmenting its holdings of the art and architecture, and, latterly, the ethnography of Afghanistan. Approximately 9,000 images reflect nearly 90 years of photography and nearly 70 years of collecting. Starting with Benjamin Rowland and his expedition to Afghanistan in 1936, a series of Harvard scholars have contributed to these collections, directly or indirectly. While the earlier contributions primarily related to pre-Islamic art and architecture, the library began actively acquiring photographs and slides of Islamic architecture from Islamic art historians and professional photographers in the 1970s after the arrival of Oleg Grabar as Harvard's Professor of Islamic Art. These have been further augmented since the founding of the Aga Khan Program for Islamic Architecture in 1979 and its Documentation Center in the Library, especially by a variety of archival collections. Most notable among these is the very large gift of photography documenting art, architecture and ethnography created by Josephine Powell. These impressive collections have never been as important as now. The devastation to Afghanistan's cultures, art and architecture caused by Soviet invasion, a prolonged war of national liberation, the subsequent civil war that devastated Kabul, and the final assault on representational art by the Taliban iconoclasts have altered these images from useful to critical documents of a past that has largely passed from view.