Three young men

Photography arrived in Myanmar in tandem with British military intervention in the mid-19th century, but soon became an affordable and attractive means for the elite to capture their own image. As the market for portraits grew, so too did the establishment of studios by local, European, Indian, Japanese and Chinese photographers such as Wah Heng. Aside from producing portraits like this one, Wah Heng & Co. supplied photographic materials, including, papers, films, lenses, and chemicals to studios across Southeast Asia from their store in Singapore. The firm is also known to have operated in Sulawesi, Indonesia.

Not unlike modern selfies, this portrait was composed and circulated to a relevant audience. Similarly, it was used to project aspects of the sitter’s identity such as their interest to engage with modernity while holding onto valuable tradition. Two of the young men wear paramilitary attire, while the third wears a Burmese longyi (skirt cloth). Ironically, given the orchestrated quality of the photograph, a strange dynamic is at play between the civet cat on the boy’s lap and the dog on the left.