Albert Kahn (1860–1940)
Albert Kahn, a French Jew, was a famous banker, monopoly and philanthropist of the time. But he is not an upstart who "people are stupid and have a lot of money", but a big boss with high cultural accomplishment.
In 1908, Albert Kahn suddenly had a magical idea: he knew that industrialization and globalization would soon completely change the world, and he wanted to comprehensively record the "Earth Archive", that is, to record the world at that time with color photographs.
Although color photography was born in 1904, it was not until 1936, when the United States introduced Kodak Crom color film (reverse film), that photographers used color film. It was not until 1942, after the appearance of Kodak color negatives, that color photography really went to the public.
The Chinese people in the late Qing Dynasty were so poor that they could not afford to wear clothes, and they all had yellow faces and thin muscles
It was more than a hundred years before we realized the peerless value of Albert Kahn's 1908 photograph of the color "Earth Archives." The earliest color photographs in almost most parts of the world were recorded by Kahn (and his team), just four years after the birth of color photography.
Albert Kahn's color photography project covers more than 50 countries around the world and has captured a total of 72,000 color photographs. At that time, the photographic technology was not color film, but "glass dry plate color positive", that is, the use of large-format cameras, the use of glass dry plates, shooting reverse film (later popularized film is negative).
Let's take a look at the color China (late Qing dynasty) recorded by Albert Kahn around 1909:
A young girl from the Qing Dynasty with a very melancholy expression, but not a beggar, but living too poorly. Her small feet are eye-catching because she is bound and belongs to the typical feudal era small-footed woman.
This is the legendary Inner Mongolian uncle, when the yurt was still there, pristine, not like it is now used for tourism.
This is the street storyteller. It looks like it was taken from a flyover in Beijing.
Miners cut stone with saws. A tourist attraction in the north, a lot of stone monuments are used. Without mechanization, it is still more difficult.
A man in the Qing Dynasty, who did not know what he was looking at, did not have a mobile phone at that time. Perhaps, watching the fish under the bridge. Is this what Dai Wangshu said "holding an oil-paper umbrella"?
Beijing's bell tower, I don't know if it's a front yard or a backyard, the scenery is completely different now.
This is again a poor village, this kind of house does not know where the style, and there is a big chimney.
The newly married girl originally thought it was a Manchu woman, but the loquat in the vase felt that this should have been filmed in the south.
The last soldiers of the Great Qing Dynasty, this is no longer the style of the Shenji Battalion, when the army had begun to modernize. But the editor looked at it and looked at it, and it looked like the current security guard. His appearance, malnourished, and insufficient combat attack power.
The streets of Shenyang are much more luxurious than they feel.
The city gate of Shenyang should not exist now, right? Such majestic ancient city walls and gates are very rare in the whole country.
The Ming Tombs, this has certainly not become a scenic area, messy.
Where was this filmed? What are the two Taoist priests doing?
This photo is a bit different in style, because the women in the late Qing dynasty photos are all sitting upright. But this woman is so envious, dressed and gestured, she is a little out of line. Maybe it's the Qinglou woman.
Jinan Daming Lake. The editor visited Daming Lake in 2015 and feels that this scenery still exists now, more than a hundred years ago.