The Musée départemental Albert-Kahn (Boulogne-Billancourt, France) offers a digitized collection of autochromes taken around the world, including in China in the early-twentieth century. These photographs are part of the Archives de la Planète [Archives of the Planet]: a three-decade long privately funded project ended in 1931 that compiled a visual inventory of the world utilizing ground-breaking types of media from that time, namely autochrome and film.
Amongst the operators sent around the world on behalf of the Archives de la Planète was Stéphane Passet (1875-1941), who travelled across China, visiting and recording places such as Beijing (which composes a large part of the archive in China) and northern sites (Great Wall and Ming Tombs), Shenyang, Zhangjiakou, Qufu, Shanghai, places along the Yangtze River, and Taishan.
