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Collection consists of Japanese hand-coloured glass lantern slides collected by James Davidson in Formosa (present day Taiwan), and possibly also in Japan, between 1894 and 1902. Davidson used these slides for his lectures. All the photographs except 10 belong to the genre known as souvenir photography. The subject of these photographs in this collection echoed those found in the Japanese ukiyo-e prints of the so-called “floating-world” of the late Edo Period, from around 1780 until the 1860s. The delicate hand colouring of the albumen silver prints is one of the characteristics of photographs of Japan from this period.

Additionally, there are nine glass lantern slides showing images of the aftermath of the 1891 Mino–Owari earthquake in Japan. These are mostly copies of images published in the book "The Great Earthquake of Japan, 1891" by John Milne and W.K. Burton, and most of these photographs were taken by William Kinnimond Burton, a Scottish engineer and photographer who worked in Japan. A copy of "The Great Earthquake of Japan, 1891" is available in the MOA Library.