Exterior of North Fort Showing the English Entrance, August 21, 1860

Art Historical Context

Step into the charged atmosphere of 19th-century conflict with Felice Beato's *Exterior of North Fort Showing the Entrance, August 21 1860*. This albumen print, captured mere days after the Anglo-French assault on the Tak Forts during the Second Opium War offers a poignant glimpse of imperial warfare's aftermath. Beato, a pioneering British-Italian photographer renowned for his-the-ground documentation of battles from the Crimean War to the Indian Rebellion, arrived at the North Fort just as British forces breached its defenses, immortalizing the scarred landscape and shattered gateway. The image's historical weight lies in its eyewitness account of a pivotal moment: on August 21, 1860, Allied troops stormed these Dagu fortifications near Tianjin, China, paving the way to Beijing and the war's humiliating end for the Qing Dynasty with the looting of the Summer Palace. Beato's lens reveals not just architectural ruin but the raw toll of empire-building, blending stark realism with subtle composition that draws the eye to the fort's ominous entrance. Crafted via the albumen process—using egg whites to bind light-sensitive silver salts onto paper—this 23.8 × 29.1 cm print exemplifies early photographic brilliance, yielding deep tonal contrasts and fine detail that brought distant wars vividly to Western audiences. Housed in the National Gallery of Art's photography collection (gift of Michael and Jane Wilson), it underscores Beato's legacy as a founder of war photojournalism, inviting us to reflect on history's unblinking gaze.

About the Artist

Felice Beato · 1832–1909

Felice Beato (c. 1832–1909), an Italian-born photographer who became a British subject through his family's residence on the British protectorate island of Corfu, emerged as one of the pioneering figures in war and travel photography. Born in Venice or Corfu to a Venetian noble family with roots in Corfu, Beato's early life remains somewhat obscure, but he acquired his first photographic lens in P...