It sounds like a quiz question. What do a Cecil Beaton portrait of the Queen, a Mini, Brian Duffy’s photograph of David Bowie for the Aladdin Sane album, a Hussein Chalayan tulle dress and the London Aquatics Centre have in common?
They have all been chosen to represent highlights of British creativity in the forthcoming Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A) show British Design 1948–2012, and for the book to accompany it. With such a broad theme, the book is a big one: 350 images, 400-plus pages, 26 contributors.
The contributors submitted lists of their “ideal” images to the curators, Christopher Breward and Ghislaine Wood, who then had the task of reconciling the authors’ lists with that of the exhibition, producing a master list for clearance.
We then tried to find interesting ways to show the objects, always preferring to feature a dress modelled in a fashion photograph, rather than mounted on a mannequin, for example.
The images themselves came from a huge range of sources: as well as museums and galleries, we have sourced from churches, computer games and the attics of designers from across the country. Previously, responsibility for clearances for the book lay with the publishing department.
However, following last autumn’s Postmodernism exhibition we now have a dedicated rights clearance team working across museum departments. They cleared for everything – the book, the marketing poster and press, private view invites, exhibition contextual material and retail and licensing product. Their work increasingly includes video, and other kinds of rights.
As well as reducing repeated work within the museum, this centralised process was more streamlined for lenders: before, a lender could find themselves contacted several times over, by different departments within the museum, each with a slightly different request and deadline. Asking for the same image 10 times means negotiating the price each time, which is costly for everyone.
Increasingly, the museum clears many different kinds of rights – from digital video to music – and there are many benefits to thinking about the book as part of the wider clearance process. However, as an editor, it is always satisfying to think of the book as the longest lasting record of both that process and the exhibition.
Frances Ambler is an editor at V&A Publishing
They have all been chosen to represent highlights of British creativity in the forthcoming Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A) show British Design 1948–2012, and for the book to accompany it. With such a broad theme, the book is a big one: 350 images, 400-plus pages, 26 contributors.
The contributors submitted lists of their “ideal” images to the curators, Christopher Breward and Ghislaine Wood, who then had the task of reconciling the authors’ lists with that of the exhibition, producing a master list for clearance.
We then tried to find interesting ways to show the objects, always preferring to feature a dress modelled in a fashion photograph, rather than mounted on a mannequin, for example.
The images themselves came from a huge range of sources: as well as museums and galleries, we have sourced from churches, computer games and the attics of designers from across the country. Previously, responsibility for clearances for the book lay with the publishing department.
However, following last autumn’s Postmodernism exhibition we now have a dedicated rights clearance team working across museum departments. They cleared for everything – the book, the marketing poster and press, private view invites, exhibition contextual material and retail and licensing product. Their work increasingly includes video, and other kinds of rights.
As well as reducing repeated work within the museum, this centralised process was more streamlined for lenders: before, a lender could find themselves contacted several times over, by different departments within the museum, each with a slightly different request and deadline. Asking for the same image 10 times means negotiating the price each time, which is costly for everyone.
Increasingly, the museum clears many different kinds of rights – from digital video to music – and there are many benefits to thinking about the book as part of the wider clearance process. However, as an editor, it is always satisfying to think of the book as the longest lasting record of both that process and the exhibition.
Frances Ambler is an editor at V&A Publishing
