Dancers in ruins of Angkor-Vat, Cambodia, 1922 © Albert-Kahn museum, from http://www.ejumpcut.org
The promised follow-up series on Albert Kahn’s Archives de la Planète project, covering the 1920s, started on BBC4 this evening. The four-part series, The Twenties in Colour, follows on from the earlier series, The Wonderful World of Albert Kahn, in showing how Kahn’s team of still and motion picture photographers continued their task to make a photographic recod of the world. Included in the series is Paris after the Armistice, scenes in the Middle and Far East, and (I hope) some of the scientific-medical cinematography produced by Jean Comandon, who collaborated with Kahn in the late twenties.
Those who want find more about Kahn’s work, and web sources for Autochrome photographs etc, should go to the earlier post, Searching for Albert Kahn, which has the background story and a number of useful links.
Meanwhile, for those of us unable (or in my case, too idle) to get hold of BBC4, the original Wonderful World of Albert Kahn series is to be showing in re-edited, half-hour episodes form on BBC2, starting 16 November, at 19.30pm.
The Bioscope 
i have never been so excited in my life about a tv programme. by the time i had watched some of it, it was too late to tape it. also sky plus is not the same as owning the film and watching it whenever you like on whatever screen you like. i do hope you produce a dvd of this series. please!!
From what I’ve heard, there are no plans from the BBC to produce a DVD of the series, presumably because the Albert Kahn museum itself is unwilling to licence the images for the purpose. However, I’ve heard reports that the Albert Kahn museum is planning to issue its own DVDs of its Autochrome collection (and maybe the films as well) some time in 2008. I’ll post something on this site as and when I find out more.
The BBC series is available for viewing for a week after from transmission from the iPlayer service, for those who have access to that.
I downloaded the program in Divx / Xvid format from file-sharing sites, and can think of no greater purpose in such a thing than sharing these precious documents with a wider audience.
If no DVD or HD release is intended, the museum is clearly confused about the purpose of museums.
This website does not condone theft by downloading from file-sharing sites in any form.