The Forgotten Photo Library of the Manuscript Department of the Prussian State Library: Investigating German Photographic Archives in Polish Collections
Ewa Manikowska
emanikowska@hotmail.comInstitute of Art, Polish Academy of Science (Poland)
https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6633-823X
Abstract
In focus of this article is the photographic archive of the Manuscript Department of the former Prussian State Library (Preußische Staatsbibliothek), which was recently rediscovered among the holdings of the National Museum in Warsaw. The origins and complex history of this collection serve as a starting point for a broader examination of the under-researched issue of German photographic archives preserved in Polish memory institutions. Moving beyond a Polish-German perspective, the article analyses these collections through the wider lens of international scholarly cooperation. In addition, the article demonstrates that the Prussian State Library’s photographic archive served similar functions in Warsaw as it had previously in Berlin. In interwar Germany and postwar Poland, both marked by economic crises and limited international contacts, it became a tool for scholars to restore the international status of their research. Furthermore, the article posits that the informal archive available to Polish art historians in the postwar years may have contributed to the prominence of iconographic research within Polish art history.
Keywords:
“Berlinka”, photographic archives, manuscript research and preservation, internationalism in science, Kunstschutz, National Museum in Warsaw, Preußische StaatsbibliothekReferences
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Authors
Ewa Manikowskaemanikowska@hotmail.com
Institute of Art, Polish Academy of Science Poland
https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6633-823X
Ewa Manikowska is an art and cultural historian currently associate professor at the Institute of Art of the Polish Academy of Sciences. She has both an academic and a museum curriculum, having worked, among other roles, as a provenance research expert in the National Museum in Warsaw (2016–2020). Her research interest Focus on collecting, museum and library history, cultural heritage, history of photography, and provenance research.
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