Magnum forgets

[Chuck Albertson]

It would be interesting to know how they burned through $100,000,000 and are now back looking for outside investments.

The Dell money went to pay off a lot of accrued liabilities, principally to the members themselves: http://time.com/4815139/magnum-photos-agency-investment/

 

[CK Dexter Haven]

Naive question? If they've been struggling for money for so long, couldn't they have staged a series of traveling exhibitions? Major cities across the US, Europe, Japan and China? 1 with Classics and 1 with contemporary works? 2 months in each city.... And books to match?

 

[ptpdprinter]

Since it is private organization, there's no way of knowing, but a photo agency, even one of Magnum's stature, and $100,000,000 do not seem like they belong in the same sentence. What exactly do they spend significant amounts of money on? Seems like they just need to pay for office rent and storage facilities, and a few employees to hustle up and coordinate assignments for their photographers. The business model just isn't that complex.

 

[PKR]

http://www.bjp-online.com/2017/06/john-vink-leaves-magnum-due-to-post-investment-contract/

The contract makes the photographers into employees.

Years ago, when working for a major publisher (Time-Life), assignments were given out to both staff and freelance/stringers. The assignment was paid for by the day. A day rate. In the 70s the Luce people lobbied for the "Work for Hire" contract and it became law. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Work_for_hire

Before WFH all rights were owned by the artist/photographer. After WFH, if you wanted to work for Luce, you signed it. It gave Time-Life full or part ownership of your work.. subject to any modification you may have negotiated. It was an ugly thing for most freelancers. Many of these people became commercial artists and photographers because of WFH.
http://www.nytimes.com/learning/general/onthisday/bday/0403.html

It seems Magnum may have dipped a toe into the WFH world. If so, I think it will be their undoing. Where did that $100,000,000 go? That's a lot of money ... even in the world of web billionaires.

I'm sure more of this story will come out if members become unhappy with the new work environment. Martin Parr is just one member of Magnum. Until we've heard from the HCB foundation, Erwitt, Fusco, Koudelka, Davidson, et all. It's a mystery.