About the collection makers: Milton and Janaki Manaki were the first Balkan's cinematographers, movie makers, photographers, craftsmen, members of the society's elite. They laid the foundations of the Balkan's photography and cinematography, beginning with their work at the end of the XIX century. They were witnesses on the stormy political events of the territory of geographical Macedonia in the XX century, and they showed wider cultural vision and dimension in the field of photography exceeding the level of studio work, for commercial needs of the citizens, typical for their colleague's craftsmen. They were dedicated to outdoors photographing, and their work, today is priceless in value because of the different segments of the society shown in their photographs. Their work has been subject of many scientific studies from the field of culture, arts and history from researchers from Europe and all around the world. About the collection: The collection number in The State Archives in the Republic of North Macedonia is 580. It was brought to the State archive by agreement between the Bitola city authorities and the wife and son of Milton Manaki. It is one of the most important collection in the State archive - Bitola department and one of the most explored one. Note: according to macedonian archive standards the historical catalogue will be fully completed after the final processing of the collection which is expected to be finished in 2024.
Extent: The fonds has a total of 23 boxes, six of which contain documentation from the members of the Manaki family (biographical materials, personal documents, correspondence, documents for business activity with the properties, books from the Manaki family's photographic and cinematographic activities, etc., a total of 1,253 archival units with 3,867 sheets of paper). The remaining 17 archival boxes contain photographs made by the Manaki brothers. The total number of original prints is 10981. There are also 6563 glass negatives with descriptions, 1351 sheet films. The fonds also contains 49 units of photo and cinema equipment and significant number of unarranged glass, roll and sheet films negatives without description that are yet to be processed, arranged and scanned.
Custodial history: The bulk of the material was purchased from the Manaki family ( wife and son of the deceased Milton) in 1964 by the then called Historical Archives of Bitola and has been kept in the same instiution from that point on.
Arrangement: The collection has been arranged and rearranged several times from 1964 to 2022 and it is still an ongoing process. Part of the glass plate negatives (around 7000) and only a small part of the sheet and roll films were cataloged by Milton Manaki around 1962/3 and an unknown archive worker. The cataloges contain 12 categories but rarely more than 7 are used. The glass plates without description for the most do not follow any archival rules but they are sometimes in bundles that follow the same theme.The same rule applies for the film sheets and roll films. The documentation and the original prints are kept in archival boxes (23) and are arranged by archival rules from 1994 (the last time that the fonds has been thoroughly rearranged). The people who have worked on the fonds (in chronological order, starting from the earliest onward ) are:Ljubica Eftimova (who wrote Milton's words into the glass plate negative registers) Todorka Doga, Viktorija Dimitrova, Aleksandar Krstevski, Areti Sidovska, Slobodanka Georgjieva and Dimitar Gjorgjievski.
Author(s)/Creator(s): Milton and Yanaki Manaki; Manaki family.
Scribe(s): Milton and Yanaki Manaki; Manaki family on the hand written matterial.
Original institution reference: MKD.DARSM.02.0580.
