The Cultural Department of the Albanian Embassy in Berlin will organize an exhibition of the pioneers of Albanian photography Marubi, entitled ‘499965’ which will be held at Irrgang gallery in Berlin on April 18, 2016 at 19:00.
The exhibition will feature 35 unique photographs with historical and artistic values of Photo Studio Marubi photographers.
Born in 1843, Italian painter and photographer Pietro Marubi emigrated for political reasons from his hometown Piacenza, Italy to Shkodra, Northern Albania around 1850. He later founded Marubi Photo Studio ( Fototeka Marubi), the oldest collection of which dates from 1858-1859. Some of the first photographs included in Marubi’s first photo collection were published in The London Illustrated News, the La Guerra d’Oriente, and L’Illustration. Marubi was assisted by Rrok Kodheli and his brother Kel Kodheli who after Marubi’ death changed his name to Kel Marubi and took over the family business and developing it even more.
Nowadays, the landmark Marubi photo Collection in Shkodra houses over 500,000 photos and negatives compiled by three generations of photographers that trace the beginning of Albanian photography and carry within themselves a lot of history along with artistic and cultural values that depict how Albania looked like from 1858 until 1940.
Last year the landmark Marubi photo collection was restored under a project supported by the Albanian-American Development Foundation (AADF) with over 1.5 million euros made available by the Albanian government, the AADF, and the European Commission.
Featuring photographs by Pietro Marubi, Kel Marubi, Gegà« Marubi, Mati Kodheli Marubi, Kel Kodheli Marubi, Kol Idromeno, Shan Pici, Dedà« Jakova, Pjetà«r Raboshta, Angjelin Nà«nshati, etc, the Marubi archive was transferred into a new building in the center of Shkodra last December.
One of the largest photo libraries in the Balkans, over 100,000 photos of the late 19th and early 20th centuries of the Marubi archives were made available online at the Marubi virtual museum in October 2015.
The exhibition will stay open until April 25, 2016.
