| Description | This album documents the field study trip that Hilda Margaret Whitaker née Hodge joined to explore the mangrove swamps, forests and bat caves of Malaysia and Indonesia, using the media of photography and artworks to capture the study expedition with the Sumatra Field Studies Council. Other members of the party, including the noted naturalist, Dr. Gathorne Gathorne-Hardy, 5th Earl of Cranbrook, are photographed. The volume consists of documentary photographs, photographs taken as reference aids and observational drawings and paintings, supplemented by postcards, journal pages, a copy of the journal Nature Malaysiana [Vol. 12 No. 1] and clippings. Interestingly, a 15th century coin - 'tin money' - from the First Sultanate Period in Malacca has been kept by Margaret '...to aid memory & understanding'. Original drawings in the album are as follows: Page 2: Forest drawn in charcoal and ink; Page 4: Forest in watercolour and ink; Page 5: pencil and ink drawing of the Pasoh Forest; Page 6: Stream at the Forestry Research Centre, rendered in watercolour, pencil and ink; Page 7: Pencil and ink drawing annotated 'Bohinnia on Fig on strangulated tree Pasoh Forest'; Page 8: 'Drying the washing Ulu Gombak' watercolour, pencil and ink depiction of village life; Page 9: Pencil, watercolour and ink figurative sketch of the Orang Asli Family, annotated 'Piped water family wash Ulu Gombak'. Due to deterioration of the original album, constructed in plastic and board, the mounted pages have been removed and repackaged in acid free wallets, whilst maintaining the context of the original volume. |