The Black Star Collection includes 291,049 black and white photographs representing 20th century world events. The Collection features images of historical subjects including the Great Wars, European history, the American Civil Rights movement, as well as major international political and cultural figures from Marilyn Munroe to Mussolini and Chagall to Castro, popular culture, and early space exploration. Many of the photographs appeared originally in the early years of Life magazine. The Black Star Collection images at Ryerson University were taken all over the world, between the 1930s and the 1980s. They help define the 20th Century.

The New York-based Black Star Agency was started in 1935 by three Jewish intellectuals when they were exiled from Germany. Ernest Mayer, who was the owner of the Berlin-based Mauritius photo agency, transported some 5,000 images from his agency to New York. Together with fellow emigres Kurt Safranski, a literary editor, and Kurt Kornfeld, a literary agent, they founded The Black Star Agency and established it in New York City’s Graybar Building near Grand Central Station. The Black Star Agency represented photographers who documented significant people and events around the world in news photos and photo essays, for such clients as Life magazine, Look, the Saturday Evening Post, Colliers, Ladies Home Journal, Redbook, McCall’s, Cosmopolitan, the New York Times, Time magazine, Newsweek, and many other major publications. A shortlist of the agency’s photographers includes Robert Capa, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Andreas Feininger, Germaine Krull, Philippe Halsmann, Martin Munkacsi, W. Eugene Smith, Marion Post-Wolcott, Bill Brandt, and Mario Giancomelli. Ben and Howard Chapnik worked at the Black Star Agency with Mayer, Safranski and Kornfeld before taking it over in 1963. The Black Star Agency continues to exist in New York, under the presidency of Ben Chapnik.

The Black Star Collection was acquired by Ryerson University through an anonymous donor.

The Collection is particularly well-known for it’s coverage in:

• European and American life before the Second World War
• The Second World War, Spanish Civil War, and Japanese invasion of China
• Post-war life in Europe and The United States of America
• The Civil Rights era, for which the Collection in particularly distinguished
• The Vietnam War, including the French phase
• 20th Century political figures
• American presidents
• Popular culture: trends, lifestyles, and headline events
• Personalities in sports, entertainment, and cultural fields
• Fashion photographs
• Scientific advancement in diverse fields, particularly space exploration