The Magnum Mark sets out to celebrate the legacy of Magnum's print archive, uncovering the processes behind traditional, manual image dissemination. Included in the exhibition are previously unseen “press” prints featuring the work of Magnum’s founding member, George Rodger, recreating one of Magnum’s original distribution sets and including some of the magazines in which the work was first shown.
A graphic panel translates the meaning of the mysterious marks and stamps on the back of Magnum’s vintage press distribution prints and a selection of print maps, produced by Magnum’s in-house printer, illustrate the craft involved in printing Magnum’s famous photographs.
The darkroom print maps feature popular photographs of James Dean by Dennis Stock, Marilyn Monroe and Arthur Miller by Inge Morath, Sofia Loren by David ‘Chim’ Seymour and Sammy Davis Jr. by Burt Glinn. The process of printing a photograph as a final ‘object’ is a labour of love for most photographers and to see their handwritten notes is incredible. It felt like I had an insight into a photographers work at first hand.
In addition to examining the processes behind Magnum’s traditional image distribution, the exhibition includes a small selection of some of agency’s greatest known images; the controversial ‘Falling Soldier’ by Robert Capa, Marilyn Monroe on the set of the Misfits by Eve Arnold, a student defying tanks in Tiananmen Square by Stuart Franklin, and Thomas Hoepker’s image of September 11th.
One thing to mention, although this is an 'exhibition', on entrance I was handed a price list; many prints were over £2000 and the books on the shelves were 'not to be touched'!
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