Outside of Luxor’s illustrious Winter Palace is a small shop whose walls are filled with books, vintage photographs, and remnants of decades past: the Gaddis & Co store.The store is a relic in its own right, holding around 2500 glass plate negatives of Egypt’s photographic stories and memories. At the center of the shop sits a wooden box camera, a tool through which Egypt’s history and heritage can be told. What is the story of this shop? The story of the Gaddis & Co shop goes back to Attiya Gaddis, one of the earliest Egyptian studio photographers. Before Gaddis and his short-term business partner Girguis Seif, there were little to no traces of Egyptian photographers. Egypt is a scenic landscape—every corner allures the curiosity of worldwide photographers. Its enduring glamor attracted foreign photographers, capturing its beauty, leaving no room for the emergence of Egyptian photographers. European photographs had acclimated to technical advancements in the field, which lent them the upper hand. Many historians assumed that there were several reasons for the prevention of Egyptians becoming photographers. Up until the 20th century, the only known Egyptian photographer on record was Colonel…
