Patricia Seppälä Foundation to provide support to the Press Photo Archive
The Patricia Seppälä Foundation will support the digitisation work carried out by the Finnish Heritage Agency’s Press Photo Archive with EUR 48,000 in the period 2025–2027. The photo materials will be arranged and a sample collection created, often in collaboration with the photographer. The selected photos will be digitised, catalogued and published for public access and use in the Finna search service.
The Patricia Seppälä Foundation has granted the Finnish Heritage Agency’s Press Photo Archive JOKA grant of EUR 48,000 for the upcoming three-year period. From 2025 to 2027, JOKA will have access to EUR 16,000 of annual funding for the digitisation work of the Press Photo Archive. The foundation awarded the first three-year grant to JOKA in 2021.
“The valuable support of the Patricia Seppälä Foundation helps us continue effective cooperation in spreading information on press photo collections and making them available for public use”, says Ismo Malinen, Chief Intendant of Picture Collections at the Finnish Heritage Agency.
The aim of the cooperation is to make the Finnish journalistic, documentary and photojournalistic collections in the Press Photo Archive available to an increasing number of users.
“From the foundation’s perspective, cooperation with JOKA has been very fruitful. Our support has led to great results, and more and more interesting Finnish press photos are becoming available in Finna”, rejoices Paula Arvas, the Executive Officer of the Patricia Seppälä Foundation.
Photos by Seppo Saves and Ensio Liesimaa to be digitised in 2025
In 2025, the funding from the Patricia Seppälä Foundation will be used, for example, to continue to catalogue the exhibition prints of artist professor Seppo Saves (1940–2013). The investigation and digitisation of the hundreds of exhibition prints by Saves began in 2023, when JOKA received the collection.
During his career, Saves photographed for publications such as Apu, Suomen Kuvalehti and Viikkosanomat. In Uusi Suomi, he worked as a press photographer, the head of the photography department and head photographer. He was one of the cooperative society Finnseven’s seven photographers between 1965 and 1970.
JOKA will also use the foundation’s funding in 2025 to investigate the collection of newspaper photographer Ensio Liesimaa (1918–1986). A sample collection will be digitised. Liesimaa was the head photographer for Eeva magazine and also photographed for such magazines as Taide, Tieteen maailma and Elokuva-Aitta. The collection includes a large number of still images from Finnish films. Liesimaa’s estate handed the collection over to JOKA in 2024.
Between 2022 and 2024, JOKA used the funding provided by the Patricia Seppälä Foundation to digitise press photos by Räshid Nasretdin (1920–2010), Heikki Y. Rissanen (1942–2016), Eero Sauri (b. 1938), Timo Kirves (1939–2021), Jukka Kuusisto (b. 1945), Vilho Uomala (1910–1979), Seppo Saves (1940–2013), and Atte Matilainen (1924–1018) as well as the collections of Maaseudun Tulevaisuus.
Press photos digitised with the support from the Patricia Seppälä Foundation will be captioned and published in Finna, a joint service of museums, archives and libraries
Finnish Heritage Agency’s Press Photo Archive JOKA was founded in 2014 as part of the Finnish Heritage Agency’s Picture Collections. JOKA maintains, digitises and publishes collections by key photographers, newspapers and magazines, taking care of storing the history of Finnish photojournalism. JOKA’s collections include 20 million press photographs, nearly 30,000 of which have been published in JOKA-Finna.
Patricia Seppälä Foundation promotes photojournalism, newspaper and periodical photography and documentary photography, awarding annual grants to individuals and other actors in the field. The foundation also grants the Patricia Seppälä Foundation Photojournalism Award, the most prestigious award of its kind in Finland.
Photo: Professor of sociology Erik Allardt, Apu
magazine photographer Seppo Saves and journalist Heikki Brotherus made a three-month trip to New Guinea in 1962. Photo: Seppo Saves / Press Photo Archive JOKA / Finnish Heritage Agency