Corbis (www.corbis.com) today announced that, beginning in 2008, the Sygma collection will have a new long-term home at an advanced, climate controlled preservation facility to be built near Paris, France. The announcement is the next phase of Corbis’ “Sygma Preservation and Access Initiative,” a project that began in 2004 to ensure that the collections’ 50 million objects including slides, negatives, prints and contact sheets are carefully protected in a secure, climate controlled environment while being brought to life and made more widely accessible.
“Corbis is committed to investing in the preservation of the profoundly important Sygma archive, one of the greatest collections of photojournalism in the world and an invaluable historical record of many momentous events from the past half century,” said Gary Shenk, President, Corbis. “We are proud to undertake this preservation and access initiative to ensure that this visually stunning, iconic collection is safely conserved, highly accessible and can be shared with people around the world.”
Corbis is collaborating with Locarchives, a proven specialist in archiving and document management, who will build the new “living” archive dedicated specifically to the Sygma collection. It will be located in Garnay, approximately 45 minutes outside Paris, making it easily accessible for photographers, researchers, historians, iconographers and others professionals interested in consulting the archives in person. The eight hundred square meter facility will have approximately seven thousand meters of shelving in a climate controlled, airtight environment with advanced fire safety and security protections. Once opened, the site will be managed by Corbis.
Since 2005, a dedicated team of Corbis editors and archivists has been undertaking the initial phases of the “Sygma Preservation and Access Initiative” leading up to the move of the collection. This has involved changing the archive classification system to classify pictures by photographer rather than by theme to regularize royalties, promote the collection and make it accessible to the public via the digitalization of prints.
Lastly, Corbis is collaborating closely with the photographers to bring the collection to life by searching, identifying and digitizing the most significant photos from the collection to be available via the Corbis website. Since 2002, Corbis has digitized more than 55,000 pictures to bring the total number available online to 800,000 from the collection.
The Sygma archive is comprised of nine separate collections of unique photos from the second half of the 20th century. The 1950s and 1960s imagery includes photography from Apis, Universal Photo, Interpress, Spitzer, Reporter Associés and other agencies. The collections from the 1970s and beyond includes the prestigious photojournalism, news, magazines, celebrities and portraits from the Sygma photo agency, as well as television and movie set imagery from Kipa, and sporting events from Tempsport.
About Corbis
Corbis is a world leader in digital media. By providing the industry’s richest array of digital image licensing, rights services, artist representation and media management, Corbis enables creative innovation for advertising, corporate marketing and editorial clients. Corbis is headquartered in Seattle, with 23 offices throughout North America, Europe, Asia and Australia.
This article was last modified on April 3, 2022
This article was first published on February 22, 2007
Commenting is easier and faster when you're logged in!
