A BALKAN RETROSPECT

VOLKMAR WENTZEL

“The only way out of today’s misery is for people
to be worthy of each other’s trust.” —Albert Schweitzer

After nearly half a century as a photographer and writer for the National Geographic Society, I looked forward to making greater use of the Cosmos Club. I wanted to lounge in the comfortable leather chairs of the Club’s library and read, in a leisurely fashion, some of the fascinating books written by fellow members. At home, I was anxious to browse through a lifetime collection of photographs. Retirement, it seemed, would be a good time to recall my worldwide travels and look back upon the good life with which I have been blessed.

Almost immediately, I discovered an inheritance from my father: more than a hundred 9 x 12cm glass plate negatives he had taken in the Balkan countries between 1906-1910, just before World War I. My father, Dr. Fritz Wentzel, was a distinguished photo chemist and dedicated photographer ever since, as a 13-year-old, he snapped his first enamorata with a Stirn detective camera on a Tiergarten bench in Berlin. Later, he earned his doctorate in chemistry and engineering at the Technische Hochschule in Berlin. Like Alfred Stieglitz, he studied under Professor Dr. Hermann Vogel (1834-1898), the celebrated scientist and early champion of photography as an art form.

In contrast to my own rather unorganized collection of countless black-and-white negatives and 35mm Kodachromes, my father’s plates were neatly wrapped in black wax paper and packaged by the dozen in their original boxes. Most were of a brand called Satrap, manufactured in Munich. The labels bore the profile of a bearded Assyrian warrior with a warning in several languages: “Handle in Ruby Red Light Only.” On each box, my father had neatly written such intriguing place names as Ragusa, Spalato, and Curcula. Others were titled Bosnia/Herzegovina, Serbia, Croatia, and Dalmatia, the same names we see in the headlines today.

A Dalmation coastal barque

To my delight, when I enlarged these negatives, I found that much of the beauty that had inspired my father could still be coaxed out of these nearly century-old plates. In the twilight of my darkroom, with every gentle rocking of the developer tray, his visions emerged. Moments of another time, a peaceful time, were reawakened.

With his Mentor Graflex-type camera that allowed him to compose boldly, focus selectively, and see the image up to the very instant of releasing the shutter, my father took me into the markets, bazaars, and the arcaded courtyards of elegant mosques. The polyglot Balkan population came very much alive: blond Croats and Slovenes; proud Serbs and Montenegrins; dignified Moslems in baggy pants and embroidered sheepskin vests. In Ragusa (now Dubrovnik), a priest and monk exchange jokes. Ancient vessels recall a maritime trade with Venice that flourished in the Middle Ages. A peaceful, multicultural mix trafficked over the graceful 16th century Mostar Bridge, while ducks paddled happily in the Neretva River 70 feet below.

My father’s photographs generally reflect the pictorialist trend of the time. They have no shock value and are not dazzling or bizarre. In a simple, thoughtful, and well-composed way, they document a gentler chapter in the history of the Balkans. For his photographic achievements he was awarded the prestigious silver and gold medals of the Vienna Photographic Society, medals that depict the three graces of photography— light, optics, and chemistry. In resurrecting these photographs, I sense a prenatal kinship with this part of the world. It was aboard the fabled Orient Express that my father’s first glimpse of my mother led to love and marriage and, eventually, me. And being me, I wonder if these old photographs can help to heal that now bedeviled part of the world.

Photographs by Fritz Wentzel

Mostar Bridge over the Neretva River		Mosque in Ejub, near Constantinople
Market in Cattaro, Montenegro		A priest and a monk in Ragusa, Herzegovina

Volkmar Wentzel (CC ‘74) worked for the National Geographic as a writer and photographer from 1937-1985. His assignments took him to Tibet, India, Nepal, and Africa, and throughout North and South America.

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