Research Guides: Early Photography in Asia: Vietnam

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Early photography in Vietnam

Studio photography reached Vietnam in the 1860s, the same decade that the French were rapidly colonizing southern Vietnam. Some of the earliest photographs of the region came from French photographers such as Émile Gsell, who set a photographic studio in Saigon (now Ho Chi Minh City) in 1866. Around that same year, Chinese photographers from Hong Kong, such as the Pun Lun studio, were also beginning to operate in Saigon. Other Chinese photographers would soon operate studios in Hanoi. By the end of the 1800s and the early 1900s, Vietnamese photographers began operating their own studios, particularly under Nguyễn Đình Khánh (who went by the name Khánh Ký). Chinese and Vietnamese studios often focused on portraiture photography, particularly as photographs became popular in home ancestral altars. Much of the travel, descriptive, documentary, and ethnographic photographs of Vietnam before the 1930s, however, came from a French colonial context. Both personal photographs and books spread French photography around the world, providing a skewed perspective on Vietnam and its people during the colonial period.

French photographers

Through most of the 1800s, western travelers to, or colonial agents in, Asia did not often have their own cameras, which were still large, used fragile glass plates, and were labor and chemically intensive. Therefore, many went to photo studios in large cities to purchase premade photo albums or select professional photographs to create their own album. By the 1890s, however, film photography (or snapshot photography) was gradually becoming accessible, sometimes leading to photograph albums that were a mix of studio photography and original photographs. The albums below mostly date from the 1890s and were indeed a mix of professionally published and personal snapshot photographs.

Photograph album of Northern Vietnam and Hanoi
Call Number: RBC Photo albums DS559.92.T6 P46 1888z

Publication Date: 1888-1898

Note: link goes to the digitized album.
A photograph album with images of French colonial North Vietnam (then called Tonkin and part of French Indochina) in the late nineteenth century. The owner of the album was very likely a French colonial agent or soldier, perhaps one of the French men pictured in the original images. The images are a mix of studio and original photographs of a variety of cities, towns, and people in Northern Vietnam.
Photograph album of southern Vietnam and Ho Chi Minh City
Call Number: RBC Photo albums DS559.92.C6 P46 1890z

Publication Date: c. 1890-1900

Note: link goes to the digitized album.
A photograph album containing images from the late nineteenth century of southern Vietnam (then Cochinchina) and Ho Chi Minh City (then Saigon), as well as a few from Cambodia (Angkor Wat) and Laos. The album was likely compiled, and possibly photographed by, a French colonial agent in southern Vietnam, probably the family pictured in multiple images near the back of the album.
Photograph album of Ho Chi Minh City compiled by Claude-Marie Devenet
Call Number: RBC Photo albums DS559.93.S2 D48 1895z

Publication Date: c. 1895

Note: link goes to the digitized album.
A photograph album showing people and buildings in Ho Chi Minh City (then Saigon) and surrounding areas, at the time colonized by France and part of Indochina. It was likely compiled with a mix of studio photographs and original photographs by the French sculptor Claude-Marie Devenet in the 1890s. The images document French colonial city life, the surrounding rivers and river life, Vang Tau, native villages, and colonial French residencies, businesses, and people.
Photograph album of Vietnam and Cambodia, c. 1897
Call Number: RBC Photo albums DS556.36 .P461 1897

Publication Date: c. 1897

Note: link goes to the digitized album.
A photograph album by a French traveler or colonial agent of Vietnam and Cambodia (then French Indochina) in the 1890s. The photographer traveled to the ruins of Angkor Wat, Angkor Thom, and Phnom Penh in Cambodia. They also traveled among indigenous people and villages in Southern and Central Vietnam. They seem to have been based in Ho Chi Minh City (then Saigon) and were part of an early bicycling club there called the "Groupe du Cercle Cycliste Saigon."
Tonkin types : photograph album by Pierre Dieulefils
Call Number: RBC Photo albums DS534 .T66 1900z

Publication Date: circa 1900-1909

Note: link goes to the digitized album.
A small, portable album with twelve mounted gelatin silver photographs of people and places in northern Vietnam captioned in French in the negative. The album was likely compiled and sold by the French photographer Pierre Dieulefils out of his studio in Hanoi, Vietnam during the first decade of the twentieth century for a French colonial audience.

Published photographs of Vietnam

French photographers and publishers

The majority of photographs in published books related to Vietnam came from French photographers and colonizers. By the early twentieth century, books and souvenir photography (particularly postcards) circulated around the world, serving as the way in which many outside of Vietnam pictured the people and the country, obviously filtered through colonial narratives and the colonial gaze.

Indochine pittoresque & monumentale : Annam-Tonkin by Pierre Dieulefils
Call Number: RBC OS1 DS556.36 .D54 1909

Publication Date: 1909-1910

Note: link goes to the digitized book.
A published book with photographic reproductions (photogravures) showing people and places across modern central and northern Vietnam, particularly the cities of Hué and Hanoi, the Cao Bang region, a variety of smaller villages and historical sites in northern Vietnam, and ethnic groups in central and northern Vietnam, including the Lolo, Mans, and Méo peoples.
Les races du Haut-Tonkin de Phong-Tho à Lang-Son by Maurice Abadie ; préface de Paul Pelliot
Call Number: Scuba DS556.44 A23 1924

Publication Date: 1924

Note: link goes to another digitized copy on the Internet Archive.
A detailed French account of the various peoples of Northern Vietnam along the border with China. The work was written and photographed by Maurice Abadie, who served in the French colonial infantry, bringing with him a variety of imperial and colonial notions about the people of Vietnam.
Indochine Française : les races. Album no. 1 by Gouvernement Général de l'Indochine
Call Number: RBC Photo albums DS556.44 .I53 1925

Publication Date: 1925

Note: link goes to the digitized book.
A photograph album with 21 gelatin silver prints made by the French colonial government in Indochina showing people across many ethnic groups in modern-day Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia. These handmade photo albums were made between 1924 and 1928 and often given to diplomats and prestigious visitors.
La Cochinchine : album général illustré de 456 gravures sur cuivre
Call Number: RBC OS1 DS559.92.C6 C62 1925

Publication Date: 1925-1926

Note: not digitized.
Descriptions and photographs of each of the French colonial provinces in Cochinchina (then part of French colonial Indochina), modern southern Vietnam.
France : métropole et colonies
Call Number: Wolff DC20 .F85 1933

Publication Date: 1933-1938

Note: not digitized.
Album no. 24: L'Indochine Française: Les Montagnes -- views include: Forêt Dense (Nord-Annam), Forêt De Pins (Haut-Laos), Forêt-Clairière (Haut-Laos), Case Thai, Case Man, Vers Cao Bang (Tonkin), Case Meo (Tran Ninh)
Album no. 25: L'Indochine Française: Les Plaines -- views include: Hersage de Rizière (Cochinchine), Repiquage du Riz (Centre-Annam), Moisson du Riz (Tonkin), Magnanerie Indigène (Annam), Pê̂che Dans Une Mare (Tonkin), Case Annamite (Cochinchine), Cases Cambodgiennes, Paysage du Thanh Hoa.

Vietnamese photographers and publishers

Nguyễn Đình Khánh (who went by the name Khánh Ký), was one of the most famous Vietnamese photographers in history. He opened his first studio in Hanoi, after working under Chinese photo studios, in 1893. By the 1920s, his studios had spread throughout Vietnam.