Johnny Cash 1965 / 2009

The Edward Hulton Archive Picture Collection established in 1947, has grown over the years through the integration of other collections and developed into one of the most significant sources of photographic history. It was originally intended as an image archive of Hulton’s weekly magazine, Picture Post. Through its merger with the Londoner Keystone Collection in 1988, the portfolio doubled. When Getty acquired it in 1996, the Hulton Archive became one of the largest collections in the world, with 40 million photographs. Getty then combined the collection with Archive Photos, another noteworthy photography contingent dating back to the 1930’s, thus turning Hulton into somewhat of an image monopoly.

It includes such classic images as those of the legendary portraitist Julia Margaret Cameron, the master of motion studies, Eadweard Muybridge and representatives of so-called Straight Photography, who, with their pure and hard vision, made photography textbooks appear obsolete and revolutionized the photographic medium. The spectrum of the Hulton Archive, however, spans into the present, offering contemporary documentary photography highlights, like celebrity portraits from the last century.

This unique “Geschichtsspeicher (History Warehouse)“ eternalizes spectacular political decisions, touching and anonymous personal fates, and prominent personalities. Emotions, existential situations and nostalgia are transported to the level of high art and raise the question of what photography can achieve. At the very least, we get an answer when we involve ourselves with the material: photography can aesthetically, and sometimes even politically, change the world.