POWERHOUSE COLLECTION

Collection of photographs of China

Object No. 2009/104/6

The photographs are significant documents relating to the operations of the Eurasia Aviation Corporation in China in the early twentieth century. They depict places such as Canton, Hankou, Lanzhou, Beijing including Forbidden City, Summer Palace and Ming Tombs, Shanghai, Xian and the Yangtze River. The photographs also document life and people in those places. Many of the photographs have been stamped on the back with the name 'Hans Koester', who was a German pilot working for the Eurasia Aviation Corporation. The address written on one of the boxes marked "ILFORD", 27 Billyard Avenue Elizabeth Bay, Sydney is likely to have been the residence of J.P. Koester. It is likely that J.P. Koester was a relative of 'Hans Koester' and migrated to Australia. Number 27 Billyard Avenue is now a block of flats. The telephone number FL 3504, also written on the box, is a Sydney telephone number. Alphabetic area codes were used in phone numbers up until the early 1940s. FL was the code for the Eastern Suburbs. Among the photographs in the collection are rare images of senior figures in Tibetan Buddhism documenting their interactions with Chinese and Western officials. Many photographs portray the life of ordinary people. Aspects of Koester's life and travels can also be glimpsed. It would appear that Koester had considerable contact with Chinese and Tibetan people. Many of the photographs document ceremonies that he attended as a consequence of transporting Panchen Lama (meaning "Great Scholar") back to Tibet. This specific event that a number of the photographs document occurred when the Panchen Lama arrived on the upper Xining River near the capital of Gansu following his travels in Central China, Manchuria and Inner Mongolia. The Panchen Lama depicted in 3 of the photographs was the 6th Panchen Lama, Thubten Choekyi Nyima (1883-1937), who was recognised as the Panchen Lama in one of the four great monasteries of the Gelugpa School of Tibetan Buddhism. The Gelungpa school was found in 1447 considers Thubten Choekyi Nyima the 9th Panchen Lama as they count back three incarnations further to Khedrup Glek Pelsang who they consider to be the first Panchen Lama. During 1913, on the basis of political experience gained abroad, the 13th Dalai Lama decided to reform Tibet to provide it with a well-equipped and well-trained army. The Dalai Lama and Tibetan government decided to introduce a special levy for the aristocracy and religious institutions to cover this cost. The 6th Panchen Lama, who had previously not paid any taxes, initially declared that it was unfair. In 1923, the Lhasa government again reminded the Panchen Lama that he had to pay the levy but the negotiations remained deadlocked. The Panchen Lama sent an offering of incense to the Dalai Lama indicating that he was changing his residence. In return, the Dalai Lama sent a white horse to the Panchen which in symbolic terms, authorised him to leave Tibet. After his departure from the Tashilhunpo monastery, the Panchen Lama travelled to Inner Mongolia and then Gansu. The Panchen Lama, an important religious figure for the Republican Chinese government exercised spiritual influence to pacify Tibetan and Mongolian people who had seceded from China in 1911 and whose territories stretched along China's north-western border. As a result, from the middle of 1924 to early 1925, the Panchen Lama was under the protection of local warlords in Gansu who provided for his security and material requirements. According to the American scholar Warren Smith, the Panchen Lama's flight hampered the Dalai Lama's Attempt to create Tibetan political unity and to centralise Tibetan administration. One photograph taken by Koester records the 6th Panchen Lama sitting in an airplane (Guomindang or KMT is the Chinese National People's Party that ruled China from 1912). After extensive travels in Gansu, the Panchen Lama accepted an invitation to visit Beijing. He travelled there on 17 January 1925 with a large escort. The historian Jamyang Norbu says of this image: "the photograph depicting a saintly though naïf figure was possibly used by the Chinese Nationalist government to weaken Tibetan effort to demonstrate their independence". The majority of the photographs in the collection are thought to have been taken by Hans Koester, a German Pilot. Hans Koester served Eurasia Aviation from 25 January 1934 to 28 February 1937. At the time, the airways were controlled by the Chinese Nationalist Government. Private aeroplanes were not allowed. The photographs provide important documentation of China during that period. The Eurasia Aviation Corporation was established in February, 1930. The China National Aviation Corporation (CNAC) was founded earlier in 1929 and commenced commercial services between Shanghai and Hankou, a distance of 539 miles. At about the same time, a German company was in negotiation with the Chinese government, to open a new airline. On 21 February 1930 a ten-year agreement between Luft Hansa Deutsche and the Chinese Ministry of Transport was for the operation of "Eurasia", a Sino-German corporation. Luft Hansa was at the time one of the largest aviation enterprises in Europe. Air Eurasia was set up to open up a shorter and faster route between China and Germany (Berlin). The Eurasia Aviation Corporation was a transport company controlled by the Chinese government and had weekly service to Lanzhou, north western China. The international route was never operational. In 1931 and 1932, 40% of Eurasia's passengers were officials who travelled free of charge. The plan to link Shanghai to Tchukuchak (Chuguchak) on the boarder of Xinjiang was short lived owing to political disturbances in Xinjiang. In 1937, the airline operated some 2,480 miles from Shanghai to Lanzhou and Baotou and to Kunming in Yunnan province. The company grew rapidly. In 1936, its planes flew 565,015 miles and carried 5,115 passengers, 59,314 pounds of mail and 433,831 pounds of freight, an increase of nearly 100% over 1935. Reference Hall E. Russell 'Expanding Airways in the Far East' in Far Eastern Survey, Vol. 6, No. 9 (Apr. 28, 1937), Institute of Pacific Relations, pp.95-101 Karl Morgenstern & Dietmar Plath, Eurasia Aviation Coorporation: Junkers & Lufthansa in China 1931-1943, Geramond, Munchen, 2006 Lillico Stuart, 'The Punchen Lama' in The China Journal Vol., XXI September 1934, No.3 http://www.talesofoldchina.com/journal/193409/t-340902.php, 06/05/09 'The flight to the Middle Kingdom', Lufthansa China newslink Special13/2006, pp3-6, http://konzern.lufthansa.com/en/downloads/presse/newslink/newslink_2006_09sp13/nl_sp13e_china.pdf, 06/05/09 William C. Kirby, "Technocratic Organization and Technological Development in China, 1928-1953." In Science and Technology in Post-Mao China, edited by Denis Fred Simon and Merle Goldman, 23-44. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1989 William C. Kirby, "The Chinese War Economy: Mobilization, Control, and Planning in Nationalist China." In China's Bitter Victory: The War With Japan, 1937-1945, edited by Steven I. Levine and James C. Hsiung, 185-213. New York: M.E. Sharpe, 1992. William C. Kirby, "Intercultural Contacts and International Relations: China's Relations with Germany, the Soviet Union and the United States, 1927-1944." In Deutschland und China, edited by Kuo Heng-yü and Mechthild Leutner, 225-252. Münich: Minerva, 1994. Warren Smith, Tibetan Nation, Westview Press, Boulder, Colorado, 1996 Jamyang Norbu, BLACK ANNALS: Goldstein & The Negation Of Tibetan History (Part II), http://www.jamyangnorbu.com/blog/2008/07/27/black-annals-goldstein-the-negation-of-tibetan-history-part-ii/, 10/06/09 Anna Kim, Curatorial Research Assistant