In 1907 the Lumiere brothers, who wowed Paris with its first commercially shown movies in the 1890s, demonstrated the autochrome photographic process, with which color photos could be taken by a glass-plate camera. The banker Albert Kahn embraced it and the next year launched a project that would continue until the Great Depression bankrupted him. Kahn felt that if the world’s people could see one another, animosity based on stereotypes would be dispelled and world peace realized. He dispatched opérateurs, some female, with autochrome plates and movie film to capture how the Other looked and lived for a maximally public archive. It was the dream of, Musée Albert-Kahn’s director Gilles Baud-Berthier says, a man of the nineteenth century, perhaps even the eighteenth—but not the twentieth. So much for outdated idealism. But just look at the pictures, full of the fascination of all old photodocumentation, heightened by color more sensual than later color processes deliver. Accompanied by a nontechnical text and complementing a BBC-TV series, this is a world-history buff’s delight. --Ray Olson
Review
"The French banker Albert Kahn (1860-1940) was another gambler ensorcelled by the wonders of photography. A wealthy philanthropist who hoped to promote world peace by recording life around the globe on film, he was until recently an obscure figure. David Okefuna's richly illustrated book on his life, published in the U.S. by Princeton University Press in conjunction with a BBC documentary, helped change that perception."---Richard B. Woodward, Wall Street Journal
"You'll see priceless photographs of a world in transition, including haunting shots from the poverty-stricken farms of Ireland and the battlefield trenches of the First World War. The images are fascinating, both from a historical and an artistic perspective. And one of the great things about this book is that author David Okuefuna provides enough information to help you understand how the images were taken and also their historical context. . . . The pictures featured in this book are stunning and offer a unique view of world history and also the beginnings of color photography."---Nicole Warburton, Deseret Morning News
"The collection boasts what may be the earliest color photographs of the Taj Mahal and the Egyptian pyramids, as well as striking portraits of Kurdish women in northern Iraq, dancers from the Khmer ballet in Angkor, and itinerant Mongolian hunters on the steppes near the Russian border. But does the past change when we see it in color? In many instances, the vivid palette brings the images closer to our present moment, making the world--and the distance of history--frighteningly small."---Nicole Rudick, Bookforum
"The pictures [are] full of the fascination of all old photodocumentation, heightened by color more sensual than later color processes deliver without tweaking. Accompanied by a direct, nontechnical text and complementing a BBC-TV series, this is a world-history buff's delight."---Ray Olson, Booklist
"Autochrome technology was taken up by French philanthropist Albert Kahn, who sent photographers all over the world to record in color the panoply of human cultures, all in the interest of mutual understanding and peace. The results of Kahn's generosity are on display in The Dawn of the Color Photograph, and they amount to a massive collage of the early decades of the 20th century, a time."---Dennis Drabelle, Washington Post Book World
"This fascinating book includes mostly posed groups of farmers, workers and artisans from Western Europe, the Americas, the Far East, Africa and Indochina."---Regan McMahon, San Francisco Chronicle
"When the Lumière brothers invented colour photography in 1907, one of their countrymen immediately saw in it the possibility of promoting cross-cultural understanding. Albert Kahn, a banker and pacifist from Paris, dispatched photographers around the globe to document the people they found. For the next 20 years, they immortalized Germans, Montenegrins, Egyptians, Mongolians and every other manner of global citizen. This isn't a book about photography; it's a pictorial history of the colour-saturated world that existed before we all started wearing blue jeans and Nike T-shirts." ― The Globe and Mail
"Most of us would think that photos of a trip around the world made in 1908 couldn't possibly have been taken in colour, but they were. This book gives a fascinating look at some of the beautiful 72,000 colour images, which are accompanied in the archives by 4,000 black and white photographs and 120 hours of rare documentary film footage, all housed in the Musee Albert-Kahn in a Parisian suburbs."---Nancy Tousley, Calgary Herald
"Amazing, filled with color photographs shot from about 1909 to 1929. French banker Albert Kahn sent a team of photographers to shoot pictures in autochrome, the first portable color photographic process around the globe. Blue sails, red cloaks, yellow flowers: The hues are astonishing, and so are the glimpses of a vanished world."---Sarah Bryan Miller, St. Louis Post-Dispatch
"A beautifully illustrated book. . . . The Dawn of the Color Photograph is a handsome document full of lush and memorable images. Most of us still picture 1909 exclusively in black and white, so it's a revelation to peer back 100 years and see such eerily bright hues."---Dushko Petrovich, The Boston Globe
"The photographs, hundreds of which are compiled in the new book, are breathtaking. . . . [An] extraordinary volume. . . . Countless beautiful images of now-lost worlds to enthrall us and remind us where we came from."---Raquel Laneri, Forbes.com
"Albert Kahn's collection of early color photographs is recognized as one of the world's most important. The Dawn of the Color Photograph makes it easy to see why." ― Art New England
"You can hardly read this collection without being conscious of the remarkable research effort involved in bringing together hundreds of thinly documented photos and attempting to write informative captions for each."---James F. X. O'Gara, Weekly Standard
"To celebrate a century of the little-known collection, Princeton University Press has issued an impressive new monograph, The Dawn of the Color Photograph: Albert Kahn's Archives of the Planet. . . . The new book is the first widely available collection to reproduce Kahn's photographs from every region of the world."---Mark Cohen, Nextbook.org
"David Okuefuna, a producer of the BBC television series 'The Wonderful World of Albert Kahn,' is to be commended for making Kahn's early color photography accessible. It is a joy to behold."---Larry Cox, King Features Weekly Service
Review
"An astonishing, captivating, and extraordinary collection of early color photographs."―Anthony W. Lee, Mount Holyoke College
Praise for the television series: "Astonishing images."―Time Out
Praise for the television series: "A fascinating and vivid celebration of the earliest examples of colour photography."―Gareth McLean, Guardian
Praise for the television series: "A legacy of inestimable richness."―Benjamin Secher, Daily Telegraph
From the Inside Flap
"An astonishing, captivating, and extraordinary collection of early color photographs."--Anthony W. Lee, Mount Holyoke College
Praise for the television series: "Astonishing images."--Time Out
Praise for the television series: "A fascinating and vivid celebration of the earliest examples of colour photography."--Gareth McLean,Guardian
Praise for the television series: "A legacy of inestimable richness."--Benjamin Secher,Daily Telegraph
From the Back Cover
"An astonishing, captivating, and extraordinary collection of early color photographs."--Anthony W. Lee, Mount Holyoke College
Praise for the television series: "Astonishing images."--Time Out
Praise for the television series: "A fascinating and vivid celebration of the earliest examples of colour photography."--Gareth McLean,Guardian
Praise for the television series: "A legacy of inestimable richness."--Benjamin Secher,Daily Telegraph
About the Author
David Okuefuna is the executive producer of the BBC television series The Wonderful World of Albert Kahn.
