Studio portrait of three Kanak men, one holding a human skull. New Caledonia, late 1870s.

Albumen print photograph, carte de visite format, 106 x 63 mm (mount); verso with wet stamp of ‘W. Dufty & Cie., Photographes, Noumea, N. C.’; the print is a little pale but is in good condition, as is the mount.

Walter Dufty, one of four English-born brothers who were pioneers of photography in the islands of the Western Pacific, operated a studio in Noumea with his brother Edward in the 1870s. The carte de visite we offer here was almost certainly taken in this period. After a sojourn in Australia, Walter returned to New Caledonia in 1883 and opened a studio in partnership with James Peace, which remained in business until 1885.