Arenapal

ArenaPAL Performing Arts Images

Type	Private
Industry	photo archive, photo library, publishing, photography and the performing arts
Genre	photography
Founded	1997
Headquarters	Edenbridge, United Kingdom
Area served	Worldwide
Services	Image licensing, picture research, archival services, arts photography commissions
Website	www.arenapal.com

ArenaPAL is a UK company, based in Edenbridge, Kent, which specialises in the licensing of performing arts images, both in the UK and throughout the world. Its collection falls under the main categories of opera, theatre, classical and contemporary music, classical and contemporary dance, as well as educational imagery covering all categories.

It manages a library of 10 million images with over 700,000 currently viewable online. The library also holds thousands of unscanned prints, negatives and transparencies. These are digitised as part of its on-site archival scanning project. In 2007, it was declared the best international image library in the world.

History

The Arenapal website serves as a portal to the company's primary search facility and distribution outlet

ArenaPAL was founded in 1997 as the first fully digitised performing arts archive. Unlike most specialist photographic agencies, it has worked with a wide range of contributors from its inception. The company continues to expand its extensive archive as well as taking in submissions of contemporary performance, including theatre, ballet, dance and opera productions, plus classical music, rock, pop and jazz events.

ArenaPAL is also a photographic commissions agency with a roster of arts photographers including Clive Barda, Richard Cannon, Eric Richmond and Hilary Shedel. ArenaPAL is a member of the British Association of Picture Libraries and Agencies (BAPLA), which has declared it: "[t]he best international performing arts photographic resource for all images users representing a unique collection from around the world", in 2007.^[1]

Collections

In 2013 www.arenapal.com launched its new Imageflows powered search engine.

In addition to the original Performing Arts Library (PAL) (*) founded by Barda,^[2]:19 the following archives and collections are represented by ArenaPAL:

• Andia (France),
• Garsington Opera,
• Glyndebourne Festival Opera (*),
  • including the Guy Gravett Collection and Mike Hoban Collection,
• the Royal Opera House Opera and Dance Archives (*),
• the University of Bristol Theatre Collection (*).
  • the Mander and Mitchenson Theatre Archive (*),^[3]
  • the Bertram Park and Yvonne Gregory Archive (*),
  • the John Vickers Archive (*),
• the Royal Academy of Dance,
• the Royal College of Music (*),
• the Boosey and Hawkes Collection,
• the Darryl Williams Dance Library (*),
• the Stanislavski Collection (Rose Bruford College of Theatre and Performance) (*),^[4]
• Collection Christophel French film archive^[5]
• IndaiPicture,
• Sputnik (RIA Novosti) Culture Russian picture library,
• the Cameron Mackintosh collection,
• the Noel Gay Organisation,
• the Prussian Heritage Image Archive (BPK),
• the Ronald Grant Film and TV Archive,
• Ullstein Bild German picture library

(*) = Exclusive Franchise

Photographers

ArenaPAL represents the archives of many photographers of the performing arts, including:

See also

• Image hosting service
• List of online image archives
• List of photo sharing websites

References

External links

• "Licence To Sell: ArenaPAL". F2 Freelance Photographer. (June/July 2009). f2freelancephotographer.com. (Subscription required). Retrieved 5 July 2010.