The Photographs of the Abdullah Frères Studio in the Collections of the RoyalPalace Archive and the Cerralbo Museum. A Perspective on the Orient
Abstract
The Royal Palace Archive and the Cerralbo Museum, both in Madrid, preserve two important photographic collections from the studio Abdullah Frères, a prominent family of nineteenth-century photographers based in Constantinople. Their photographic studio came to be regarded as one of the most important in the Ottoman Empire, and for a time they opened branches in Smyrna and Cairo, which indicates their significance in the photography business carried out in the Near East and which so strongly attracted European tourists because of its Orientalist character. In addition, they served as official photographers to the Ottoman sultans Abdülaziz and Abdülhamid II.
It is unknown how the collection held in the Royal Palace Archive arrived in Spain; it may have been a diplomatic gift to the royal court. The collection of the Cerralbo Museum is the result of the journey that Enrique de Aguilera y Gamboa, XVII Marquess of Cerralbo, made to Constantinople at the end of 1889, accompanied by his wife and her two children.
This research focuses on a detailed analysis of both photographic collections with the aim of contributing to the study of Ottoman photography and to a better understanding of the phenomenon of nineteenth-century Orientalism within the Spanish context.
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