Topfoto

A Message from Lord Pickles and Lord Blunkett, followed by Topfoto's best practice article

The ability to listen and learn from one another has always been vital in parliament, in business and in most aspects of daily life. But at this particular moment in time, as national and global events continue to reiterate, it is uncommonly crucial that we forge new channels of communication and reinforce existing ones. The following article from Topfoto is an attempt to do just that. We would welcome your thoughts on this or any other Parliamentary Review article.

Rt Hon The Lord David Blunkett, MP

Rt Hon The Lord Eric Pickles, MP

www.topfoto.co.uk

1TOPFOTO |

BEST PRACTICE REPRESENTATIVE

Managing Partner Flora Smith, in

front of the Punch volumes

Shaftesbury Avenue,

London 1949 by Chalmers

Butterfield, using early

Kodachrome colour

Founded in 1927, TopFoto licenses photographs and images,

with its archive being utilised in branding, marketing,

advertising and the media globally. The organisation has

been in the family of Managing Partner Flora Smith since the

1970s, and she is proud of the heritage and history behind

every image. She tells

The Parliamentary Review

about how she

plans to ensure that the TopFoto archive survives, in the highest

quality, for years to come.

Most people will have seen hundreds of TopFoto images already, although

they won’t realise it. If you have ever bought a packet of Tyrrells crisps, many

of the images used are supplied by us. A fan of

Punch

magazine? We won the

world-exclusive representation for Punch cartoon images. Ever fallen for the

quintessentially vintage look of Soap & Glory products in Boots? That’s us.

If you visited Burberry’s

Here We Are

exhibition at the Old Sessions House,

Christopher Bailey chose our Ken Russell photograph of a 1950s teddy girl to take

centre stage. If you know the inspirational exhibitions at Chartwell, curated by

Katherine Carter and her team, we supply nearly all the photographs of Winston

Churchill. Further afield, should aliens intercept the

Voyager

probes crossing the

universe, they too will see our photographs, which were included as part of the

Golden Record mission in 1977. From writers to gamers, accessing our priceless

photographic archive and industry-leading service is imperative for modern

storytellers’ commercial and creative outcomes. Smart companies use TopFoto’s

iconic collections of images to reinforce their brand.

FACTS ABOUT

TOPFOTO

»Managing Partner: Flora Smith

»Founded in 1927

»Located in Edenbridge, Kent

»Services: Licensing and supply

of historical and contemporary

images worldwide

»No. of employees: 9

»Act as a primary historical stills

archive for the hit TV series

Who Do You Think You Are

»www.topfoto.co.uk

TopFoto

THE PARLIAMENTARY REVIEW

Highlighting best practice

2| TOPFOTO

The archive

My family business owns one of

the largest and most significant

photographic archives in the UK. It all

began in 1927 with influential British

freelance photographer John Topham.

He started as a policeman in the 1920s,

but soon became a photographer

and had images widely published in

Illustrated, The Daily Mirror, Picture

Post, LIFE magazine

and

Farmers

Weekly

. His pictures helped portray

some of the terrible living conditions in

the UK and twice provoked questions

in the House ofCommons.

In 1975, just as John was itching

to retire and the future of his

photography was uncertain, my

mother, Joanna Smith, sought one

to illustrate her book. We found

out we were all close neighbours in

villages in the Weald, Kent. My father,

AlanSmith, realised the potential and

over a cup of tea a deal was done. He

returned triumphant, having bought

130,000 negatives, thousands of prints,

meticulous scrapbooks and allrights.

The deal launched our family on a

mission to collect and protect. They

bought and rescued what became the

expanded heart of the archive, original

content from some of the most

significant 20th-century British press

agencies to grace Fleet Street between

1905 and 1969. This visual history of

Britain and elsewhere was acquired

during the 1970s and 1980s together

with 19th-century engravings and glass

plate negatives dating from the early

1900s.

We own uniquely significant

photographer collections such as 3,000

negatives by filmmaker Ken Russell

during the 1950s and the archive

of key

Illustrated

and

Picture Post

photographer George Douglas from

the 1940s and 1950s. If you visited the

National Portrait Gallery’s exhibition on

Audrey Hepburn you will have admired

George’s portrait of her, supplied by us

and printed by Robin Bell.

High winds and stinging

rain welcome arrivals

from the West Indies at

Southampton docks on

24 October 1961

14-year-old Jean Rayner

in the exploratory stage

of Teddyism, by Ken

Russell

We own

uniquely

significant

photographer

collections

such as 3,000

negatives by

filmmaker Ken

Russell

“

»EXTRA FACT

Our earliest win was providing a large number of photos of Eva Peron

to a team taking a big gamble on a musical about her life. Our images

were used on set, with a royalty per flash agreed for their anticipated

“2week run max” back in 1978.

Evita

thus funded the first big

expansion of our business.

3TOPFOTO |

BEST PRACTICE REPRESENTATIVE

Global relevance

As a digital business, we work

globally with publishers, newspapers,

magazines, TV companies and museums

to license images for book covers,

films, exhibitions, articles and online

storytelling. That is the core business,

but at a time when the public still have

a living connection with the strongest

decades in our collections, the 1920s to

the 1960s, the rapid increase in public

engagement has taken us by surprise

and presents an opportunity. There

is rising activity around ancestry and

identity. We hold photographs of people

and places, stored in a way that is readily

accessible at pace, driven by obsession

with quality and custodianship, an

obsession shared by all our staff. This

allows us to feed a media wanting to

keep up with public appetite and interest

while keeping content fresh over time.

Of course, it is powerful to have a

unique portrait of Audrey Hepburn

and to be the only source for John

Hedgecoe’s 1966 photograph of Her

Majesty for the postage stamp, a

photograph that is practically a leading

brand in its own right, but the greatest

thrill for me is the willing engagement

of the public, responding to authentic

pictures telling authentic stories. A

Liverpool newspaper, for example,

published our pictures from a Bootle

slum, taken to illustrate the founding of

the NHS. The girl shown is now elderly

and her daughter sent in memories,

names and facts, which acts as precious

enrichment and a resource for future

generations. Part of the magic is

that you never know the future of an

image. After all, when Ken Russell was

a photographer in the early 1950s, few

had heard of him, much less would have

preserved his archive. Yet at TopFoto,

you can trace the developing eye of the

future film legend behind

Women in

Love

Tommy

and

Savage Messiah

From celebrities to unnamed families,

the strengths of the archive work

internationally through a global

network of key agency contracts built

up over 30 years. We represent great

US and European archives, such as

Alinari, Granger, Roger Viollet and

Ullstein, and we distribute our images

through them and others worldwide,

the flow taking the content up to the

present day.

Cutting through the noise

There is a lot of noise in the picture

business. It’s no secret that a few

massive platforms dominate, and

when customers are short of time

and resources, it can be hard to

communicate the tremendous

added value they get from working

with us. As a private enterprise

with the intrinsic value of a great

museum, I believe our future involves

entrepreneurial partnerships with

academic and heritage bodies. What

if, as a country, we transformed

180 years of priceless hard copy

photography to dynamic files, visible

to all? When it comes to the UK’s

photographic treasures, the heritage

value is as much in the viewable image

as in the physical photograph. Quality

is the key and we never lose sight

of this. We focus on the customer,

modernising to stay competitive,

allowing our love of history and the

universal language of photographs to

flow outwards, bringing interesting

collaborations in on the tide.

I believe our

future involves

entrepreneurial

partnerships

with academic

and heritage

bodies

“

We are the sole official

source for John Hedgecoe’s

seminal photograph of Her

Majesty the Queen. Taken

in 1966 it has global cachet

and recognition as the most

reproduced image ever,

because it is used on the

postage stamp.

The Church of God, Pine

Mountain, Kentucky,

USA in 1948

www.topfoto.co.uk

The Parliamentary Review Publication, in which this article originally appeared, contained the following foreword from Lord Pickles and Lord Blunkett.

Lord Pickles and Lord Blunkett's Foreword For The Parliamentary Review

By Lord Pickles and Lord Blunkett

The ability to listen to and learn from one another has always been vital in parliament, in business and in most aspects of daily life. But at this particular moment in time, as national and global events continue to reiterate, it is uncommonly crucial that we forge new channels of communication and reinforce existing ones.

With ongoing fractures in Westminster, the reverberations of which are being felt across the country, it is essential that politicians have a firm understanding of the challenges with which British organisations must contend; and that leaders in both the public and private sectors are aware of the difficulties faced by those working in all levels of politics, from local government to the national arena.

This is why The Parliamentary Review combines political content with stories from a wide range of organisations- small and large; new and old; those at the peak of their powers and those who have peaks to surmount. It is why these stories seek to inspire and challenge all who read them.

And it is why we, as former Labour and Conservative cabinet ministers and current members of the House of Lords, feel it is important to put aside our political differences and work together to ensure these stories are given the platform they deserve.

In this publication, you will find an insightful take on the past year in politics from the BBC’s Andrew Neil and a concise rundown of key events in industry and parliament. Most importantly, you will be able to read in-depth accounts from the individuals and organisations who make The Parliamentary Review what it is.

Lord Pickles and Lord Blunkett
Co-Chairmen of The Parliamentary Review