Albert Kahn's Striking Autochromes Of World War 1 In Color
Captured by Albert Kahn's fearless photography team, these early color photos of World War I help reveal the human side of the conflict.
World War I took place more than a century ago. As such, it’s easy to see the conflict as a mere speck in history’s rear-view mirror. But Albert Kahn’s World War I photos bring the “war to end all wars” to life.
Thanks to the then-recently invented autochrome, the photographs taken by Kahn’s team of photographers during the conflict are in color. They capture the blue of French uniforms, the crumbling gray ruins of cities like Reims, and the dark, mousy brown of trenches on the frontline.
A soldier stands near a partially concealed cannon. Conchy-les-Pots, France. 1915.Musée Albert Kahn Soldiers in Mareuil-la-Motte, France. 1915.Musée Albert Kahn A soldier writes a letter while sitting in the ruins of the Sainte-Radegonde church in Missy-sur-Aisne, France. 1917.Musée Albert Kahn Soldiers standing in a trench in Mareuil-la-Motte, France. 1915.Musée Albert Kahn Soldiers scanning the sky for planes in Conchy-les-Pots, France. 1915.Musée Albert Kahn A milkmaid rings a bell in Reims, France, with ruins behind her. 1917.Musée Albert Kahn A French-Senegalese cook in Soissons, France. 1917.Musée Albert Kahn Russian soldiers in Reims, France. 1917.Musée Albert Kahn Soldiers pose by ruins in Chivres, France. Musée Albert Kahn Doctors attend to a man with shrapnel wounds in Moreuil, France. 1916.Musée Albert Kahn Soldiers crouched on the ground eating soup in Chivres, France. 1917.Musée Albert Kahn An apple tree seems relatively unharmed in this 1917 photo of two men and a destroyed house in Aisne, France. Musée Albert Kahn An abbey converted into a stable in Soissons, France. 1917.Musée Albert Kahn The nurse major of Vauxbuin, France. 1917.Musée Albert Kahn A man and woman stand and talk near rubble in Reims, France. 1917.Musée Albert Kahn A shot of barbed wire near the French trenches in Soissons, France. 1917.Musée Albert Kahn Soldiers sitting atop rubble in Reims, France. 1917.Musée Albert Kahn Soldiers in front of the ruins of a house in Crouy, France. 1917.Musée Albert Kahn French machine gunners watch the sky in Bucy-le-Long, France. 1917.Musée Albert Kahn Children playing a game near a pile of rubble in Reims, France. 1917.Musée Albert Kahn French soldiers wounded at the Battle of Chemin des Dames (or the Second Battle of the Aisne) in 1917. During the battle, French forces suffered an estimated 187,000 casualties. Musée Albert Kahn Pilots stand by a plane in France. 1916.Though the fate of the pilots is not specified, they were near the Somme, where the deadly Battle of the Somme was fought in 1916.
Musée Albert Kahn A recently wounded soldier stands near a table of what appears to be artillery. 1917.Musée Albert Kahn Soldiers having lunch in the trenches. Soissons, France. 1917.Musée Albert Kahn A soldier from the 17th Indochinese Tirailleurs Regiment in Soissons, France. 1917.Musée Albert Kahn French soldiers standing in front of a Section photographique et cinématographique des Armées (photographic section of the army) truck in Soissons, France. 1917.Musée Albert Kahn A nurse chats with a soldier through a window in Soissons, France. 1917. Musée Albert Kahn Soldiers near an abbey in Soissons, France. 1917.Musée Albert Kahn An 86-year-old priest works to clear rubble in Soissons, France. 1917.Musée Albert Kahn A group of people in Sewen, France. 1917.Musée Albert Kahn An Italian lieutenant in Italy. 1918.Musée Albert Kahn A soldier and his bike in Reims, France. 1917.Musée Albert Kahn A nascent military camp in the forest near Compiègne, France. 1916.Musée Albert Kahn Soldiers near a train station in Reims, France, where they appear to be working atop a crater. 1917.Musée Albert Kahn Soldiers alongside a truck in Verdun, France. 1916.The Battle of Verdun, which endured for nine months in 1916, resulted in hundreds of thousands of casualties on both sides.
Musée Albert Kahn A snowy trench in Verdun, France. 1916.Musée Albert Kahn French soldiers with the carcasses of animals. Verdun, France. 1916. Musée Albert Kahn Doctors and nurses in Vauxbuin, France, working at a castle that had been converted into a hospital. 1917.Musée Albert Kahn A French bomber plane near the Somme. 1916.Musée Albert Kahn French soldiers outside a makeshift tent in Le Ployron. 1916.Musée Albert Kahn A French soldier posing for a photograph in Boulogne, France. 1916.Musée Albert Kahn A soldier taking a moment to write letters in Soissons, France. 1917.Musée Albert Kahn Soldiers clearing rubble in Reims, France. 1917.Musée Albert Kahn The ruins of Coucy-le-Château-Auffrique, France, as seen in 1921.The town was occupied by German troops starting in 1914, who destroyed the town's castle and towers when they retreated in 1917.
Musée Albert Kahn
In the gallery above, peruse some of the striking photos taken by Albert Kahn's team during World War I. And below, learn more about Kahn's mission to create a "photographic inventory of the surface of the globe."
One Man's Photographic Mission
By trade, Albert Kahn was a banker. But the Frenchman is best known for his photography project, "The Archives of the Planet," which set out to document different cultures across the world. Between 1909 and 1931, Kahn's team of photographers spread to every corner of the globe. Using the newly invented autochrome, they took vivid color photos of different cultures worldwide.
Kahn envisioned his project as "a kind of photographic inventory of the surface of the globe, occupied and organized by man, such as it presents itself at the beginning of the 20th century." And his team would ultimately take some 72,000 photos of distant places like Syria, India, and Vietnam.

Musée Albert KahnA young carpet weaver in Algiers, Algeria. Circa 1910-1912.
They documented dancers in Algeria, sprawling public gardens in Afghanistan, and royalty in Albania. And their photos, as Kahn intended, captured a stunning spectrum of the human experience.
But in 1914, some of Albert Kahn's photographers also started photographing something much closer to home: World War I, which began after the assassination of Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand.
The World War I Photographers Working For Albert Kahn
Because Ferdinand had been killed by a Serbian nationalist named Gavrilo Princip, Austria-Hungary, with the support of their ally Germany, declared war on Serbia. But Serbia was supported by Russia, so Germany soon declared war on the Russians — and then on Russia's ally, France. Germany's attack on France, through neutral Belgium and Luxembourg, also drew Great Britain into the conflict. With that, World War I began.
As the Musée Albert Kahn notes, Albert Kahn's World War I photos come from photographers like Auguste Léon, Stéphane Passet, Paul Castelnau, and Georges Chevalier, who documented the conflict as it unfolded.

Musée Albert KahnPaul Castelnau, as photographed by Auguste Léon.
Photographers like Léon and Passet had long worked on "The Archives of the Planet." Léon was the first professional camera operator recruited by Kahn in 1909 (and he would work on Kahn's photography project until 1930). Before the war, he traveled to places like the Balkans and Egypt. When the worldwide conflict broke out, Léon documented it on Kahn's behalf.
Passet started working with "The Archives of the Planet" in 1912. He had spent most of the pre-war years taking photos of people in countries like China, Mongolia, Japan, Turkey, Morocco, and India. When World War I began, he served in the artillery section of the French Army, but he continued to take photographs for Kahn's archives.
Paul Castelnau, on the other hand, was a photographer with the French Army. His wartime photos were later divided — somewhat haphazardly — between "The Archives of the Planet" and the French Army itself.
Together, they and others captured World War I in stunning color.
Albert Kahn's World War I Photos
World War I ultimately lasted four years. It ushered in a new age of terrifying weapons like mustard gas, machine-gun fire, and artillery attacks from the air, and led to the deaths of millions of people. By the time the war came to an end in 1918, the total number of military and civilian casualties exceeded 40 million, with over 20 million dead and 20 million wounded.
Albert Kahn's World War I photos, however, most often capture wartime life off the battlefield. His photographers took photos of cities left in ruins, soldiers nervously standing in trenches, and doctors tending to patients.

Musée Albert KahnA young boy in Reims, France holds a gas mask as he sits atop rubble. 1917.
They captured moments like a nurse speaking to a soldier, a priest shoveling away debris, and children playing on decimated streets. In other words, Albert Kahn's World War I photos captured the human side of the conflict.
Remarkably, for the time, they captured these moments in color, making them seem less like a page from a history book and more like "real life."
In the gallery above, peruse some of Albert Kahn's World War I photographs.
After looking through Albert Kahn's World War I photos, peruse this collection of moving photos from the American Civil War. Or, check out this stunning gallery of color photos from World War II.
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