Thilly Weissenborn’s (1889–1964) ‘Lux Studio’ was located above Mr D. G. Mulder’s ‘NV Garutsche Apotheek en Handelsonderneming’ (a pharmacy and trade association) in Garut. Since 1920 she waved a sceptre over a small group of Sudanese employees. A woman who was a photographer and an independent entrepreneur was remarkable at the time. <BR> The youngest of six children, she was born in 1889 in Kediri, but her family moved to Europe in 1892. Thilly’s older sister Else studied photography in Paris and opened a photographic studio in The Hague in 1903. Thilly learned the initial tricks of the trade in Else’s studio.<BR> Thilly Weissenborn travelled to Java in 1913 and continued learning about photography in the studio of O. Kurkdjian & Co., in Surabaya, where, under the supervision of G. P. Lewis, she was originally tasked with retouching negatives. She slowly developed into a photographer with her own style that displayed artistic similarities with the work of this famous studio. <BR> Garut was situated in the mountainous landscape of West Java and thanks to the cooler climate and beautiful location, was a popular and busy holiday destination. Thilly Weissenborn made portraits on commission in her studio, but she was also adept in documenting the much sought after and more commercial subjects such as buildings, companies and interiors. <BR> In her ‘free work’ she concentrated on taking photographs of indigenous scenes: landscapes and photographs of ‘ethnic types’, which were extremely popular with publishers and tourists. <BR> Weissenborn’s talents were not only in great demand in Preanger; she also received increasing numbers of commissions to take photographs elsewhere. She photographed Governor-General Fock’s visit to Garut, producing the beautiful album that is preserved in Tropenmuseum collection. Governor-General van Limburg Stirum asked her to photograph Buitenzorg Palace and the Cipanas Estate near Sindanglaya. Weissenborn compiled many albums with selections from her own work, also for private individuals who were leaving Garut or Preanger or who wanted to send an album to their families in the Netherlands.<BR> Weissenborn was interned in a number of different camps during the Second World War, but she managed to survive. The chaotic Bersiap period followed the Japanese surrender.1 The havoc that befell Garut did not spare Weissenborn’s ‘Lux Studio’ and it was destroyed. The Dutch soldier and amateur photographer W. Viallé rescued 48 glass negatives (13 x 18 en 18 x 24 cm) from the rubble; these are now in the Tropenmuseum collection. <BR> In 1956 Weissenborn returned to the Netherlands for good. After her death in 1964 the Tropenmuseum received an album from her estate,2 which is generally understood to be an album of stock photographs from her studio. <BR> A substantial portion of her oeuvre is contained in this rather plain looking album. Clients and publishers probably browsed this album before placing an order at ‘Lux Studio’. With the content of 149 daylight gelatine silver prints Weissenborn made an important contribution to creating a romantic ideal image of the former Dutch colony. It is immediately apparent that Weissenborn composed her idyllic images with extreme care, and in doing so her work continued in a style that had earlier been developed by the Kurkdjian photographic studio. <BR> Bron: Mansfeld, A. Photographs of the Netherlands East Indies at the Tropenmuseum, Amsterdam 2012<BR>