Atiu gathering. Cook Islands, circa 1885.

Albumen print, 170 x 215 mm, verso wet stamped ‘G. Spitz, Papeete, Tahiti, Photographie Instantanée’, and with pencilled captions in two different hands: ‘Atiu gathering (Cook Islands)’ and, probably slightly earlier in date than the larger caption, ‘The Himare [?] of the Atiu (Cook Islands)’; unmounted, loss at bottom corners, 50 mm vertical tear running from the bottom edge at lower right; otherwise a strong print with good tonal range.

Provenance: Found loose at the rear of an album of photographs of Tahiti, the Marquesas and Cook Islands compiled in the 1880s by Papeete merchant and Pacific Islands trader James Lyle Young (1849-1929).