Side Gallery
Current Exhibition
BURKE + NORFOLK
Photographs from the War in Afghanistan by John Burke and Simon Norfolk
10 December 2011 - 11 February 2012
This exhibition has been extended by an extra week.
The first ever photographs to be taken in Afghanistan were made by the Irish photographer John Burke (1843?-1900). His eloquent images form an extraordinary record of the Second Anglo-Afghan War (1878-1880), yet today he is virtually unknown.
Simon Norfolk recognised in Burke’s photographs a humane and critical eye for the British colonial project and in 2010 travelled to Afghanistan in order to follow in his footsteps. In what he terms a collaboration with his Victorian forerunner, Norfolk engaged in a kind of rephotography.
Burke’s diverse photographic output included landscapes, battlefields, archaeological sites, street scenes, portraits of British officers and ethnological group portraits of Afghans. Rather than artificially re-staging these compositions exactly, Norfolk identified contemporary equivalents, researching and travelling to Burke’s vantage points and developing a digital version of his wet plate technique.
As the singular ‘War’ in the exhibition title implies, Norfolk’s project is in part an indictment of the unrelenting impact of conflict and imperialism on the landscape and people of Afghanistan over the past 130 years. The echoing images that result from his partnership with Burke highlight points of continuity and change from either side of the twentieth-century in the war-ravaged country.
The Burke + Norfolk exhibition first opened in May this year at the Tate Modern.
To accompany the show a new book named Burke + Norfolk: Photographs From The War in Afghanistan published by Dewi Lewis Publishing £40.00, quarterbound large-format hardback 168 pages, 100 colour & duotone plates 290mm x 365mm ISBN: 978-1-907893-11-7
Short film produced by Tate Channel for the BURKE + NORFOLK exhibition at Tate Modern, 2011.
Image Captions: Top - bottom
Ferris wheel on wasteland in the Mikrorayon housing complex built during the Soviet era, Kabul. Simon Norfolk
Landholders & Labourers. John Burke.
A de-mining team from the Mine Detection Centre in Kabul with a member of the German Police who is mentoring them. Simon Norfolk
Camp and Abattis At Sherpur. 5th Punjaub Infantry. 25th Dec 1879.
This picture was taken two days after one of the fiercest battles of the war. A force of 50,000 Afghans besieged and then attacked the Cantonment and had been repulsed by the defenders making special use of the new ‘Gatling’ machine guns. Why Burke didn’t photograph the aftermath is a mystery. John Burke
- Afghan police trainees being taken to the firing ranges by US Marines, Camp Leatherneck, Helmand.