French Literature Reviews - 2026
A. Genoudet, L’Effervescence des images. Albert Kahn et la disparition du monde
Art and Visual Culture
Adrien Genoudet,
L’Effervescence des images. Albert Kahn et la disparition du monde,
Les Impressions Nouvelles, 2020.
EAN13 : 978874498220.
344 p. — 28€ — November 2020
In 1908, Albert Kahn, a wealthy Parisian banker, boarded the ocean liner "Amerika" bound for New York and set off on a multi-month journey around the world. Eager to witness various lands and peoples, he sought to immerse his gaze to understand what appeared self-evident to him: the known world was on the brink of implosion, of radical transformation—of impending disappearance.
Upon his return from the trip in 1909, he embarked on a monumental and unique project: the "Archives of the Planet." The underlying idea was straightforward: commission photographers and filmmakers to capture images—abundant images, thousands of images—to build a deliberate archive, rescuing what could still be saved before total extinction. Albert Kahn’s goal was "to fix, once and for all, aspects, practices, and modes of human activity whose fatal disappearance is merely a matter of time." When these operators returned from their missions, they were instructed to catalog, develop, sort, and store their footage to assemble one of the world's most comprehensive photographic archives. The venture would last for a little over twenty years, from 1908 to 1931, remaining ultimately unfinished due to Albert Kahn's financial ruin.
These images have reached us, and today we can look at them. They speak to us because Albert Kahn intended for them to reach us. Yet the history of the Archives of the Planet and their subsequent fate is a long-term adventure, a perilous path where images are lost and broken. To truly see these images in the present, one must grasp their effervescence and understand the temporal currents running through them. By exploring the history of the Archives of the Planet and the concealed, sometimes obscure story of Albert Kahn, L’Effervescence des images offers a journey into an extraordinary project that, now more than ever, challenges both our present and our future.
Adrien Genoudet is a filmmaker, writer, and researcher in visual history. Holding a PhD in Arts and Cinema, he is an ATER (teaching and research fellow) at the Collège de France and teaches at the École européenne supérieure de l'image. Since 2018, he has been co-editor-in-chief of the journal "Entre-Temps".
Adrien Genoudet situates his study within the broader tradition of visual history and media archaeology, examining how early twentieth-century technological innovations shaped human perception. By analyzing the monumental enterprise known as the Archives of the Planet, the book engages with foundational questions regarding memory, preservation, and the ethics of looking at a world on the brink of profound upheaval. Scholars and enthusiasts of documentary film, photography history, and cultural studies will find this volume a compelling meditation on the precarious nature of visual records.
This text serves as an essential resource for readers interested in the intersection of finance, philanthropy, and artistic patronage during the Third Republic. It helps illuminate the complex institutional and human networks behind ambitious archival projects, shedding light on the operators who traversed the globe with autochromes and early motion picture cameras. Ultimately, Genoudet invites contemporary audiences to reconsider how historical images circulate, decay, and retain their haunting urgency in our current digital age.
Read an excerpt from the book and browse its Table of Contents…