The international agency Magnum Photos, founded in 1947 by the fathers of documentary photography, Robert Capa, Henri Cartier-Bresson, David Seymour and George Rodger, has been awarded this Wednesday with the 2024 Princess of Asturias Award for Concord.
Magnum photographers have documented most of the most important events of the 20th century, including the Normandy landings, the Paris riots of May 68, the civil rights movements and the 9/11 attacks, and portrayed personalities from all walks of life.
The agency, the first cooperative in the world of photography, has offices in New York, London and Paris from which it distributes its material to the media, publishing houses, charities, brands and cultural institutions.
Magnum was founded in 1947 by war reporters Robert Capa, David Seymour “Chim”, Henri Cartier-Bresson, George Rodger, Bill Vandivert, Maria Eisner and Rita Vandivert, who would become the organization’s first president.
The Agency was founded in 1947 by photographers such as Robert Capa, Henri Cartier-Bresson and Rita Vandivert
Cartier-Bresson described the agency as “a community of thought, a shared human quality, a curiosity about what happens in the world, a respect for what happens and a desire to transcribe it visually.”
It also made history because, for the first time, photographers retained the rights to their images, since, until then, the companies that bought the photographs could use them whenever they wanted without paying the photographers more.
The Princess of Concord Award granted to Magnum Photos, which had already been a candidate in other editions, was the last of the eight awards of the XLIV edition to fail.
