The collection includes photographs taken outside Hungary from the second half of the 19th century onwards, but the bulk of the material consists of "press prints" preserved in the archives of newspapers between the two world wars. These are mainly photographs of events that were important and interesting at the time, or were sensational in the world of politics or culture. From the European countries, images of France, Great Britain, Germany, Italy, Spain and the Soviet Union are prevalent, from overseas the focus is on the United States, and from Asia the history of Mongolia and Korea. Special items in the collection are the photóhungarikas, photographs taken by Hungarian photographers in exile.
Contact Éva Fisli, fisli.eva@hnm.hu Tel.
The spring water welling up from under the lava is used for bathing by the locals. The volcanic island of Sawaii was under German rule when Vojnich was there.
"At Salailua, as in many places on Sawaii, the spring water bubbling up from under the layers of lava on the beach is captured in lava tanks, some naturally formed and some artificially constructed. When we arrived, the locals were bustling here, bathing in the stream water loudly and joyfully. We ended up at the baths, and my camera was immediately busy", Vojnich wrote about the spring-water bath in his travel notes in The Pacific Islands.
This photograph, taken in Durrës, Albania, is one of the Historical Photo Department's early amateur images that capture everyday life.
The shadow of the photographer can be seen in the centre of the composition; István Balázs was probably a soldier of Austria-Hungary that annexed the town in the second half of the World War.
The Historical Photo Department houses the photographs of Andor Radnóti (Róth) Radnóti, a doctor and former Mongolian High Commissioner for Health, from the early years of independent Mongolia. The pictures are special today because Radnóti's camera captured some of the Lamaist buildings that were destroyed in the devastation that followed in 1936.
Photograph by the Orientalist scholar Ervin Baktay of the monastery cell of Sándor Kőrösi Csoma (Tibetologist, linguist) in Zangla, which he identified. The picture can be found with the caption "Entrance to Csoma's cell with its current Lama inhabitant" in Ervin Baktay's book A világ tetején. Kőrösi Csoma Sándor nyomdokain Nyugat Tibetbe (On the top of he World. In the footsteps of Sándor Kőrösi Csoma in Western Tibet) (1930).
In the photo, from left to right, are film director Victor Saville, actor Raymond Massey (in costume), politician Sir Albert Clovering, British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain and film director and producer Alexander Korda (Sándor Korda) in the Denham Studios building, founded by the latter. The picture was probably taken on the set of The Drum, a film directed by Zoltán Korda, and is an example of press print.
The picture of Dezső Révai, also known as Turai (1903–1996) is one of the many photographs taken by Hungarian volunteers during the Spanish Civil War, preserved in the Historical Photo Department.
Ata Kandó, born Etelka Görög (1913–2017), first visited Venezuela in the early 1960s. She took photographs not only of Caracas, the country's industry, but also of the indigenous people of the Amazon region. From her photographic travelogue of her South American travels entitled Blood of the Moon, several images are included in our collection.
