Magnum Photos Collection Opens to Public

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Magnum Photos, the photographic cooperative whose members snapped some of the most iconic images of the last half of the 20th century, has sold its archives of 210,000 original press prints to an investment firm that has partnered with the University of Texas at Austin to preserve, catalog, and make accessible the photos. The collection opened to researchers, students, and the public June 17 at the university's Harry Ransom Center, a major humanities research library and museum.

"Among the many strengths of this collection is its scope and diversity," said Ransom Center Director Thomas F. Staley. The collection covers major events, celebrities, world leaders, social affairs, and enduring images such as the green-eyed “Afghan Girl” who graced the cover of National Geographic in 1985. More than 100 photographers' work is part of the collection, including Robert Capa, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Susan Meiselas, and Elliott Erwitt.

“Housing the collection at the Ransom Center not only allows this archive to be studied by photographers but also helps satisfy the huge interest in it among historians, anthropologists, curators, journalists, and the public at large,” said Mark Lubell, managing director of Magnum Photos.

Initially, the Ransom Center will maintain the organization that Magnum used, with photos in boxes divided variously by subject, photographer, and geographic region. “We wanted to make it available as quickly as we could,” Coleman explained, adding that librarians will continually be cataloging the collection to provide more information about each photograph and improve categorization.

Coleman said that the Ransom Center will host programs for students and the public with Magnum photographers “routinely” over the next five years.

A unique collection
“You can’t stop looking at these photos once you start opening the boxes,” said Coleman in a February 16 National Public Radio interview. “You get the point of view of photographers from all over the world going all over the world in the second half of the 20th century.”

“Given the technical changes that have taken place in the world of photography, including the digitization of images, a collection of prints like these will never exist again,” said Gleen Furhman, comanaging partner of MSD Capital, the private investment firm of computer mogul and Austin resident Michael Dell that purchased the photo collection.

“I am so pleased to be able to entrust this significant body of work to the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas for research, study, and exhibition,” Dell said.

Selected images can be viewed at bit.ly/magnumlightboxlink.

Resources

For more fantastic photography, try these and other titles @ your library:

George Rodger: An adventure in photography, 1908-1995
by Carole Naggar

A biography of Robert Capa's less-flamboyant business partner and Magnum Photos cofounder.

Eve Arnold's People
edited by Brigitte Lardinois

Arnold, the first female member of Magnum Photos, was Marilyn Monroe's most-trusted photographer. This collection features her exceptionally personalizing images of subjects both famous and anonymous.

Magnum: Fifty Years at the Front Line of History
by Russell Miller

Based on interviews with nearly all current members, this unauthorized history of the agency captures its constructive anarchy and functional disfunction.

Photo credit: Magnum photographer Eli Read documents the processing of the Magnum Photos collection at the Ransom Center. Photo courtesy Harry Ransom Center.