Entrance to Jugdalluck
1879
From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art
1879
From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art
Entrance to Jugdalluck is a 1879 by John Burke, a Impressionism work, depicting Ireland, held at Cleveland Museum of Art.
You’re looking at a quiet mountain pass called Jugdalluck. Rocks, scrub, and a dirt track lead into the distance. This isn’t a painting—it’s an early photograph. John Burke lugged heavy glass plates and a portable darkroom into Afghanistan during the Second Anglo-Afghan War. He couldn’t freeze gunfire, so he framed empty landscapes where battles had just happened. The stillness feels strange now, like a held breath. If you want to see more of these war-time landscapes, look up the technique called impasto.
The subject of this album is the Second Anglo-Afghan War, which was fought from 1878 to 1880. John Burke was the first photographer to photograph extensively in Afghanistan and the main photographer covering that conflict. The technology of the day did not permit action shots of battles. As is usual for early conflict photography, the pictures are landscapes of the sites of momentous incidents, views of camps and civil and military infrastructure, and portraits of the soldiers and their leaders.
This album includes some of the earliest photographs of Afghanistan.
Read the full account in the museum source.
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