Sur les terres oubliées des Petites Iles de la Sonde
Sur les terres oubliées des Petites Iles de la Sonde
PARIS
THE WORLD OF ALBERT KAHN: THE JAPANESE GARDEN
In 1893, Albert Kahn, a French banker and philanthropist, acquired a large property in Boulogne-Billancourt, on the western outskirts of Paris, where he created a unique garden containing a variety of garden styles, including English, Japanese, a rose garden and a coniferous wood. This garden became a meeting place for the French and European intelligentsia until the 1930s, when, following the crash of 1929, Kahn went bankrupt. At that time, the garden was transformed into a public park in which Kahn still walked.
In 1909, Kahn traveled to Japan with his driver and photographer, Alfred Dutertre, on business and returned with many photos from the trip. This prompted him to start a project to collect photographs of the entire Earth. He appoints Jean Brunhes as director of the project and sends photographers to all continents to record images of the planet using the first color photographs, autochrome plates and the first cinematographies.
Between 1909 and 1931, they collected 72,000 color photographs and 183,000 meters of film. These form a unique historical record of 50 countries, known as the Archives of the Planet.
Since 1986, the photographs have been collected in a museum at 14 rue du Port, Boulogne-Billancourt, on the site of his garden.
Kahn created the gardens between 1895 and 1910. The size gradually increased until it reached four hectares of landscape scenes.
Landscape designer Fumiaki Takano redesigned the Japanese garden as a tribute to Albert Kahn in 1989. It is said to be a metaphor for Kahn's life.
The river and the stone pyramids symbolize the axis of life (yang).
The Vosges forest
The red bridge is a copy of the sacred Nikko bridge in Japan.