77 Stunning Color Photos Of The World’s Cultures 100 Years Ago

Published October 11, 2015
Updated February 22, 2024

On the eve of World War I, Albert Kahn hoped he could bring about world peace with the power of the color photograph.

Algerian Dancers
Arabian Man
Bedouin In Jerusalem
Belgian Sentry On Rhine
77 Stunning Color Photos Of The World’s Cultures 100 Years Ago
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As color photography dawned in 1909, French banker Albert Kahn set out to visually document every culture across the globe. Kahn envisioned the project as a kind of antidote to the nationalism and xenophobia that had shaped his own life. Using the fortune he had amassed, he financed a team of photographers to spread across the world.

Khan's team would spend two decades taking photos. And they would eventually produce more than 70,000 photos across 50 countries, from Ireland to India — and everywhere in between.

The result is a stunning collection called "The Archives of the Planet" of people and places around the world.

Albert Kahn's Formative Early Life

When Germany annexed his home province of Alsace-Lorraine in 1871, Kahn's family fled west and Kahn eventually made his way to Paris. As Jews, the Kahn family confronted a variety of bigotry and systemic obstacles in 19th century France, but young Albert (whose given name was Abraham) navigated these forces reasonably well and received a top-tier education.

Albert Kahn

Musée Albert KahnAlbert Kahn in Paris. 1914.

In Paris, Kahn's intelligence and financial success propelled him into the French elite. He fell in among an intelligentsia that included the sculptor Auguste Rodin and the Nobel Prize winning philosopher Henri Bergson.

These friendships and his early travels to Egypt, Vietnam, and Japan broadened Kahn's vision of the possible impact he might make on world politics. He developed a fervent belief in the power of travel and cross-cultural connection to bring peace to a world on the brink of war.

The 'Around The World' Scholarship

Kahn began acting on these beliefs by establishing his "Around the World" scholarship in 1898. A precursor to many modern international exchanges, Kahn's "Author du Monde" scholarship fund paid for young doctoral graduates to travel the world.

"I ask only one thing of you," Kahn said to the scholarship winners, "it is that you keep your eyes wide open."

Men In Front Of Hindu Temple

Musée Albert KahnMen in front of a Hindu temple in present-day Lahore, Pakistan. 1914.

In addition to the scholarships, Kahn also created a garden on his estate outside Paris with a similar vision. The garden combined elements of French, British, and Japanese horticulture in order to amplify visitors' appreciation other cultures and to develop a sense of harmony between them.

The scholarship and the garden were early efforts. For Kahn, everything changed with the development of autochrome, the first scalable form of color photography. The aptly-named Lumière brothers (the French word for "light") patented it in 1903.

With this new technology, Albert Kahn had the tools to match his vision of connecting the cultures of diverse countries. He would then finance the creation of Archives de la Planète: The Archives of the Planet.

Albert Kahn's 'Archives Of The Planet'

Archives Planet Women Corfu Greece

Musée Albert KahnWomen in traditional clothing in Corfu, Greece. 1913.

From 1909 to 1931, Kahn's team traveled to 50 different countries, including Turkey, Algeria, Vietnam (which was then French Indochina), Sudan, Mongolia, and their native France. Their collective work totals 73,000 autochrome plates and over 100 hours of video.

Though the photographers' names – Auguste Léon, Stéphane Passet, Marguerite Mespoulet, Paul Castelnau, León Busy and others – have slipped into the footnotes of history, their work immortalizes the faces, clothing, and habits of the peoples of Earth as they lived a century ago.

Kahn kept these incredible records in neatly organized files in his home on the outskirts of Paris. Every Sunday afternoon, he invited friends and scholars to walk his gardens and, sometimes, peruse the global archives.

Despite his idealism of how knowledge of other cultures could cultivate good-will and peace between countries, Kahn seems to have believed that his photos existed for the viewing pleasure of society's elite. He only showed his autochromes to a few hundred people during his own lifetime.

On the other hand, Albert Kahn was much more progressive than many contemporary advocates of cultural exchange, who mainly saw cross-cultural interaction as a chance for Europeans to civilize the rest of the world. For Kahn, the goal was celebrating the rest of the world just as it was.

Morocco Autochrome Albert Kahn

Musée Albert KahnInhabitants of Benguerir, Morocco. 1912-1913.

The End Of The Photography Project

Kahn's fortune collapsed with the world economy at the end of the 1920s.

By 1931, the money for the Archive of the Planet had run out. His vision of a more peaceful future also had its limits. Kahn died, at the age of 80, only a few months into the Nazi occupation of France.

His Archives of the Planet project, though, still lives on. Visitors to Paris can drive out the suburbs to see the Albert Kahn Museum and Gardens. Though not all on display, the more than 70,000 autochrome plates are there, and the old banker's gardens have been restored.

Even decades after Kahn's death, the message of his legacy is clear: we are all, no matter where we're from, part of the same human family. We are not as different as those who wish to divide us would have us believe.

Go around the world with Kahn's photographers in the gallery above.


Next, see some of Edward Curtis' stunning photos of Native American cultures inthe early 20th century. Then, have a look at some of history's most famous photos that changed the world forever.

author
All That's Interesting
author
A New York-based publisher established in 2010, All That's Interesting brings together subject-level experts in history, true crime, and science to share stories that illuminate our world.
editor
Kaleena Fraga
editor
A staff writer for All That's Interesting, Kaleena Fraga has also had her work featured in The Washington Post and Gastro Obscura, and she published a book on the Seattle food scene for the Eat Like A Local series. She graduated from Oberlin College, where she earned a dual degree in American History and French.