Seems what we have is an original photograph taken or commissioned by Burnand as a study for the painting
Not in my opinion. Shutter and film speeds weren't that good, then.
It's the same image. I'm 99.99999r% certain of that. The "alien" photograph is probably (and much more likely IMO) simply a b/w reproduction (photograph) of the painting. Which is in the collection of the Musée d'Orsay in Paris. As the article, which I haven't read, must
surely have noted. Surely the writer would have checked and noted the connection. Surely the editor would have asked the writer if the image had been researched. Surely someone on the picture desk, or in the office, would have known of the painting, made the connection and included it in the article.
Now that would have been interesting. Instead we have further confusion - and someone else will probably, one day, quote the FT item as further evidence and support of some ludicrous notion.
Doesn't add much to a better understanding of anything and reinforces my notion that FT is just adding to the confusion.
A magazine which purports to provide serious material including photographs and other images should employ decent picture researchers. If they gratuitously print an image in some editorial context - then they should know the history of that image. And so should the writer.
Now, as I said, I haven't yet read the article - but if it doesn't make a clear reference to the original painting -- and does not research and expose that link -- then we really have to question the quality of the research which goes into making FT. If they didn't explore the connection - then FT is pointless as a serious publication and we might as well read Nexus.
Discussion of this image might have made for an interesing article.
