The Rai Archives provide essential documentation for anyone dealing with communication. An extraordinary resource, material from this television and radio archive can be used in many ways, including the production of documentaries, commercials, television specials, film and radio productions and promos.

In addition, tremendous possibilities exist for the development of publishing projects based on Rai's stock materials, including the sale of Italian soundtracks for dubbing, the sale of Rai newscasts and photographic archives, and the licensing of music materials for scores.

In a recent initiative, Rai Trade has become the sole distributor of iconographic materials stored in the archives of leading and historically important Italian companies, including Olivetti and the Ansaldo Foundation. Industrial documentaries produced by famous directors, priceless films from historical, social and scientific points of view, rare old photos, and reminders of the dawn and development of Italy's industrial civilisation, are to be stored using state-of-the-art multimedia cataloguing systems and made available for professional use. Programme makers, directors, documentary makers, advertising agencies, publishers and others will find these materials to be invaluable for their work.

Olivetti's historical archives contain revealing footage on the development of the typewriter, calculators and computers. Of particular note, and tremendous historical and cultural interest, are Olivetti's production and training films, industrial documentaries and commercials, dating back to the 1940s. These were pioneering productions for the period in which they were made, providing a foretaste of modern corporate communication techniques.

The Historical Archives of the Ansaldo Foundation contain thousands of films and photographs, as well as millions of paper-based documents, relating chiefly to industrial development from the mid-19th century to the post-war period. In addition to material gathered directly by Ansaldo, these archives are growing constantly thanks to new acquisitions and donations of filmed documents from many other firms and private sources in the Liguria region of Italy. The Archives are of inestimable worth when it comes to documenting all kinds of economic, social and cultural aspects of the 20th century, including early 1930s footage of political gatherings, the mass emigration of Italian citizens to all parts of the world, Italian emigrant workers on the New York skyscrapers of 1932, Transatlantic liners, and many other miscellaneous images from early 1900s to 1970s.

A multitude of Italian cultural images and sounds, recorded by Rai, feature almost every aspect of Italian life. The Archives include festivals and folklore, religion and the Popes, arts and cuisine, as well as the Italian passion for music, sport and fashion - including profiles of international icons such as Giorgio Armani and Gianni Versace. Also included are disasters, such as volcanoes, earthquakes and floods - natural catastrophes possessing a strange beauty that has always fascinated mankind.

Consult our catalogue at http://www.raitrade.it