From 1908–1931, French banker and philanthropist Albert Kahn sent camera operators around the world with the goal of documenting regions, cultures, and peoples for the Archives of the Planet, an image collection which now encompasses 72 000 autochromes and 183 000m of film held at the Musée Albert Kahn in Paris, France. Through a case study of the 1926 Canada mission conducted by Jean Brunhes, the archive’s scientific director in addition to the photographer, Frédéric Gadmer, this thesis attempts to assess the Kahn project as a photographic enterprise and establish how the production of images were determined by their qualities for projection. By analyzing the historical conditions, formal techniques, and material properties of the available autochromes taken across Canada, this approach will aid in better understanding the use of photography at the Archives of the Planet and the role images played as a tool for pedagogy and spectacle.
Jackie Zhang (2025) studied this question.