About
Alan Villiers’ extraordinary 1939 adventure, Sons of Sindbad, in photographs. This pictorial account of Villiers’ Arabian dhow journey showcases his skill as a photographer and chronicler of cultures much changed.
“Restoring Villiers to his rightful place among the leading Western writers about the Arabian world, such as Gertrude Bell, T E Lawrence and Wilfred Thesiger.”
Sons of Sindbad: the photographs came about following the ‘discovery’ of a treasure of photographs, forgotten and hidden away in the archives of the National Maritime Museum, in Greenwich, UK. At the time, I was doing my Masters at Exeter University where I was researching Villiers and hoping that one day I could find a way of getting his fabulous travel narrative back in print.
I’d gone to the museum to source some of the original photographs that had appeared in the first edition of Sons of Sindbad for an exhibition I was curating at the Institute of Arab and Islamic Studies.
Sons of Sindbad was first published in 1940 by London publishers Hodder & Stoughton and had been out of print in this format ever since. A world war and the passage of time had sent this important text into a kind of ocean-voyaging oblivion. But I also think that Villiers’ tall-ship fame had played a role. For the museum, who own the copyright to all his images and films, it was only natural that they would be focused on the spectacular photographs he’d taken over a lifetime dedicated to tall-ship sailing of these incredible vessels and the men who worked, lived, breathed their very essence. But for someone like me, who had no connection with tall ships but who has a connection with Kuwait, well, it was an entirely different story.
Finding these images was akin to discovering treasure. In documenting his journey with the ‘Arabs’ in their dhows, Villiers had not only captured a time long gone in terms of the days of sail. His journey aboard the ‘Triumph of Righteousness’, and his subsequent accounting of this adventure, also captured a time long-gone for Kuwait.
Sons of Sindbad: the photographs is currently out of print and has become something of a collector’s item.
The re-print of Villiers’ original Sons of Sindbad is still available for purchase. It’s a ‘ripping good yarn’ and one that I highly recommend.
Touring exhibitions
The photographs have continued on their voyage.
In 2010, the Australian National Maritime Museum, in collaboration with the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich, put together an exhibition of 45 of Villiers’ photographs. The exhibition toured maritime museums around Australia.
In December 2019, the ANMM, in collaboration with the Australian Embassy in Kuwait and the Dar al-Athar al-Islamiyyah are opening a special exhibition to celebrate the 80th anniversary of Villiers’ journey to Kuwait.
The exhibition will be held from 1 December 2019 - 31 January 2020 at the Amricani Cultural Centre before moving to the Kuwait National Assembly until the end of March 2020. It’s an honour to have been invited to participate in this special occasion.
© All images copyright National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, UK
© All text copyright Grace Pundyk 2019