Photography City Moat After Rain

A black-and-white photograph showing a defence ditch after rain. It is most probably a moat along the southern city wall, because in the distance, you can see the power lines that ran along the railway. The outer city wall stretches behind it with a fort, trees and a moat filled with water. Next to it sits a fisherman. In the distance we see the outline of the Zhengyang Gate (Zhengyangmen 正陽門), better known as the Front Gate (Qianmen 前門). The area is part of the Outer City (Waicheng 外城).

The photograph is the 110th of 449 photographs of Beijing and its surroundings in the album of Ivan Skušek Jr., purchased during his stay in Beijing (1914–1920). In the handwritten inventory of the album, the photograph is referred to as Der Stadtgraben nach einem Regen. (DZ, MV)

Information
Object history

Place of manufacture: Beijing

Manufacturing technique: black-and-white photograph

Dimensions: length: 13.4 cm, width: 8.5 cm

No. of parts: 1

Current owner: Slovene Ethnographic Museum

Date of the last acquisition: 1963

Previous owners and periods of ownership: Ivan Skušek, Jr. and Tsuneko Kondō Kawase - Marija Skušek, National Museum of Slovenia, Slovene Ethnographic Museum

Object condition, handling and damage: bluish discolouration of black colour

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