Technology

The collection of photographs has an irreplacable documentary value – its core consists of photos documenting the acitivities of more than 40 Bratislava photo studios, visual transformations of the city, social events, personalities as well as monuments and architecture. The collection has no time limit – it includes photos from the very beginning of this medium up to the present, including photos that were created and are stored as digital files (born-digital).

What does the collection document?

• Transformations of the city and society: visual transformation of the city, personalities active in it, social events, as well as monuments, architecture and the development of public space.

• Genre diversity: studio and author photos, portrait, outdoor (city panorama, natural landscape) and reportage photography (disasters, visits of significant personalities, celebrations, etc.)

• Site and overlaps: primarily Bratislava and its close vicinity (e. g. Marianka, Stupava, Svätý Jur), but it also comprises a separate comparative sample in the form of studio photos from all over the territory of Austria-Hungary.

• Forms of photographic media: analogue photos from studio photos, adjusted in company pasteboard frames, to the photos taken on film and developed on photographic paper at home or by services.

Valuable items with supra-regional significance:

• Collection of Ján Nepomuk Batka: a rare collection with international overlaps was created as a private collection of the city archivist (1845–1917). This complete collection documents his close contatcts with great personalities of contemporary musical life in Central Europe.