UPDATES
E-mail to hear about site changes, placing 'update' in body of message

Magnum resists the lure of the dollar

The entire visual history of the world could be bought up and controlled by two or three global organisations like Time Warner and the Getty oil tycoon foundation. This was the warning issued by members of the Magnum collective at the packed press conference which opened a spectacular display of some 400 images at London's Barbican Centre.

Global companies have offered to buy the Magnum group's archive, which includes some legendary photographs of the last century. But Vietnam war photographer Philip Jones Griffiths, insisted: "We will never sell out to these people." Members of this unique collective are determined to keep control over their own "products" and how they are used. And they want photography to be "passion-driven" rather than commercialised.

The last decade of the 20th century is documented in a sequence of unforgettable images from all over the planet. Scenes of heartbreaking suffering, ecological devastation and war alternate with simple human pleasures and outstanding beauty.

James Nachtwey's and Gilles Peress' shots from Afghanistan and Rwanda are amongst the most shocking. Others such as Josef Koudelka, Nikos Economopoulos, Paul Lowe, Donovan Wylie and Luc Delahaye captured an inside view of conflicts in Yugoslavia and Chechnya. Children suffering the effects of Chernobyl as well as US chemical warfare in Vietnam bring to life a world of heart-rending cruelty.

Magnum goes back more than 50 years when it was founded by four war photographers – Robert Capa, Henri Cartier Bresson, David Seymour ("Chim") and George Rodger in 1947. Capa's first published photograph was a dramatic image of the exiled revolutionary Leon Trotsky lecturing to students in Copenhagen. Don't miss this show! And give yourself time.

The book Magnum Photos is not cheap, but it will give many days of stimulation, knowledge and pleasure to anyone who buys it.