[Figures on a sampan]

Creator

British Photographer · 1837–1921

A chemistry student from Edinburgh University, John Thomson moved to the Far East in 1863, traveling and photographing throughout the 1860s in Cambodia, Ceylon, China, India, Indochina, Malaysia, and Singapore. He relocated to London in 1872, publishing the Asian images in numerous volumes. In 1876 he began making the pictures that would illustrate Adolph Smith's *Street Life in London,* an exposé