Autrefois, Maison Privee book by Bill Burke

Photographer Bill Burke has taken annual trips to Indochina ever since he first traveled to Asia in 1982. Although he usually photographed the people, Burke became aware of how the architecture absorbed as much as reflected the region's history. Transfixed by buildings like the municipal offices built by the French in the 1860s, the vaulted railroad stations and post offices of the 1930s, and the art deco fantasy cinemas of the 1960s, Burke saw the region as an architectural museum, rotting in the humidity and untouched by economic ambition, and began to trace the cultural changes in the area through its architecture. In Autrefois, Maison Privee-the title means "once a private house," and refers to the prevalent reappropriation of once private houses for municipal and government use-Burke captures the dramatic history of the area, from the influence of French colonialism through the rise of communism and the devastating effects of the Vietnam War.