Sunlight pierces an ornamental wood screen and casts shadows and highlights on the interior of an Egyptian cafe located in Cairo. A customer at left or perhaps an employee holds the end of a long-stemmed hookah water pipe (narghile) while another patron looks on from the back of the frame.  This intriguing composition was taken by English photographer Ernest R. Ashton, (c. 1867-1951-2) who recorded similar scenes in the Middle East and India.  A member of the esteemed British Linked Ring Brotherhood, his pseudonym with the group was the “Orientalist” because of the locations he frequented for photography.

 

This vintage hand-pulled photogravure was printed in sepia ink for the April, 1901 issue of Camera Notes. (vol. 4 no. 4) At the time, this groundbreaking journal of photography was the organ of The New York Camera Club and A Cairene Café appeared within its pages while Alfred Stieglitz still edited it.

Dimensions:

image:     18.8 x 14.6 cm

support:   27.9 x 19.7 cm