FOTOMUSEUM
Pioneering Female Photographer Violette Cornelius Discovered in Suitcase Negatives
Decades after her passing, thousands of negatives found inside suitcases reveal the extraordinary WWII resistance and global documentary work of Violette Cornelius.
The groundbreaking work of pioneering female photographer Violette Cornelius (1919–1998) is finally being exhibited to the public at the Nederlands Fotomuseum in Rotterdam. Thousands of her lost negatives, preserved in suitcases for decades, capture a vital lens on history.
Based in Amsterdam, Cornelius was an active World War II resistance member who forged identity documents and chronicled the underground movement. In later decades, her reportage spanned global travels to Mali, Iraq, India, and Peru, where she documented the profound human impacts of rapid urbanization.