Old East Asian Photographs in Slovene Collections: techniques and motifs (workshop)

Within the framework of the inter-institutional project East Asian Collections in Slovenia, the Department of Asian Studies of the Faculty of Arts at Ljubljana University organized in cooperation with the Maritime Museum Piran and the Slovenian Ethnographic Museum a two-day regional workshop on the origin of old East Asian photographs held in Slovenian museums and private collections. The workshop took place on 15 and 16 December 2022.

 

 

On the first day, the participants gathered at the Maritime Museum in Piran. After the introductory addresses by Franco Juri, the Museum Director, and Dr Maja Veselič, associate of the VAZ project from the Department of Asian Studies of the Faculty of Arts in Ljubljana, Mio Wakita, the esteemed expert in East Asian photography from the Museum of Applied Arts (MAK) in Vienna, presented the origins of photography in Japan and East Asia, photographic studios in Japan and the making of photo albums. This highly interesting presentation was followed by a survey and analysis of albums and East Asian photos from the collections of mariners held by the Piran Maritime Museum and the Military History Park in Pivka. The collections and mariners themselves were presented by Bogdana Marinac, the Piran Museum Councillor. New findings and insights given by experts on East Asian artefacts led by Mia Wakita present a major contribution to research on the provenance and origin of photos and albums, and their evaluation at the same time.

 

 

On the second day, the workshop was carried on in Ljubljana with participants viewing photo albums in the National and University Library, at the Faculty of Arts and at the Slovene Ethnographic Museum. Among the collections on display, the mariners’ collections prevailed this time, too.