The Ravensbrück Memorial Museum archives over 36,000 photographs in its photograph collection. More than half of them are digitised. In addition to the photoprints, the collection contains 16,000 negatives, including glass negatives in various sizes. They are professionally stored and restored.
There are only a few photographs from the time of the women's concentration camp. The Memorial Museum is in possession of 92 photographs in a large-format SS album from 1940/41, which show the camp grounds, various buildings and prisoners performing forced labour. In addition, there are several albums from the private possession of female guards as well as photographs taken immediately after liberation in 1945 and in the first post-war years.
One focus of the collection is on photographs of former prisoners, including from the time before and after their imprisonment in the Ravensbrück Concentration Camp and its satellite camps. Photographs relating to the history of the memorial site, events and the buildings on site are also archived.
The photograph collection holds photos from the following periods:
- Ravensbrück Concentration Camp (1939-1945)
- Post-war period up to the establishment of the Memorial Museum (1945-1959)
- Ravensbrück National Memorial Museum of the GDR (1959-1993)
- Subsequent use of the site by the Soviet army and CIS forces (1945-1993)
- Ravensbrück Memorial Museum since the establishment of the Brandenburg Memorials Foundation in 1993
The digitised holdings can be searched on-site in our database. Please register with us with advance notice for on-site research.
Please note that fees may be charged for the production of digital reproductions and publications in accordance with the fee schedule of the Brandenburg Memorials Foundation.
