NINO holds the legacy of Frank Scholten (1881-1942), author of the two volume publication La Palestine illustrée (1929, subsequent editions in English, German, and Dutch). The volumes, “including references to passages illustrated in the Bible, the Talmud and the Koran”, were richly illustrated with photographs made by Scholten.
The Scholten Collection consists mainly of the many photographs taken by Scholten, an avid amateur photographer, on his travels in Europe and the Middle East. From his large number of photos from the Levant he selected images for his publication. He did not live to complete his plan to produce further volumes of La Palestine illustrée, and the majority of his photos were never published. A few highlights from the Scholten photographic collection are presented here.
Mapping the Mandate: Frank Scholten in the ‘Holy Lands’
All printed photographs and negatives in the Frank Scholten Collection have been digitised, funded by the Frank Scholten Fund. The digital images are available in Leiden University Libraries Digital Collections to view and download.
The digitisation project (2021-2022) has been carried out in cooperation with our partners:
The project “Mapping the Mandate” is building a user-friendly interface that geo-locates all photographs in the collection. Project members:
Temporary exhibitions
Archeologie en toerisme in het Heilige Land (Leiden, 2020)
In 2020 the National Museum of Antiquities, Leiden, exhibited eight photographs from the Scholten Collection in large format, as well as a short documentary (9:31 mins.) on Scholten’s life and work in British Mandate Palestine. The small exhibition was titled Archeologie en toerisme in het Heilige Land and was organised in cooperation with stichting Zenobia.
View the documentary here:
