Nynee Tall from South End c. 1858 - 1862

John Murray, a Scottish doctor and pioneer photographer in India, created this albumen print of Nynee Tall from South End. Murray, working in the mid-19th century, operated within the British colonial context. His work brings up questions about whose perspectives were being visually recorded and circulated. This image, with its picturesque composition, reflects the aesthetic values of the time, yet it also suggests a particular relationship between the colonizer and the colonized. Notice how the figures on the path are diminutive, almost swallowed by the landscape. How might this composition reflect colonial power dynamics, where the land and its people are viewed from a distance, perhaps as resources to be managed? Murray’s photographs were not neutral documents; they were shaped by the cultural and political milieu of British India. They provide a window into how the landscape and its inhabitants were perceived and presented during this period. What stories do these images conceal, and whose voices are missing from this carefully constructed view?