Storyblocks Launches New “Re: Stock” Media Collections to Fuel Visibility of Indigenous Stories in Advertising and Media

In Celebration of Indigenous Peoples’ Day, Storyblocks Adds New Media Collections Highlighting Themes such as Indigenous Joy, Community Conservation and Food Sovereignty

Storyblocks, the first and largest subscription-based platform providing unlimited stock content and tools for creators to keep up with the growing demand for video, today launched its newest set of collections for “Re: Stock,” an initiative focused on providing content creators and advertisers with more diverse and inclusive stock footage in order to drive visibility of underrepresented communities. The new collections showcase Native American and First Nations communities across the United States and Canada and were curated by Indigenous filmmakers with close relationships to Indigenous Peoples including Tekpatl Kuauhtzin, Carol Murphy, Paul Wilson, and Sonya Ballentyne. The collections will also feature Nainoa Langer and Sam Potter, filmmakers committed to amplifying the stories of the Hawaiian people and culture. The collections will dive into themes such as food sovereignty, Indigenous joy, community and conservation, Indigenous environmentalism and the natural world.

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“By selecting Indigenous filmmakers from different geographic regions, our goal is to equip content creators and advertisers with the footage they need to portray underrepresented Indigenous communities from around the world in a fully dimensional light instead of relying on inaccurate tropes and stereotypes,” said Sydney Carlton, Senior Director of Brand and Creative at Storyblocks. “Stock media provides the building blocks for most of the content we see across advertising and media, which makes our mission of expanding the pipeline of diverse stock contributors all the more important in making the media we consume more authentic and representative of the world we live in.”

Following the success of the first two installments of Storyblocks’ “Re: Stock” initiative, which focused on boosting the amount of content featuring authentic experiences of BIPOC and LGBTQIA+ communities from an intersectional lens, the company is further expanding the landscape of its stock contributors to include directors, filmmakers and cinematographers who belong to Native American and First Nations communities. Storyblocks commissioned a cohort of five filmmakers from different geographic regions of the world to each create collections of 50+ videos that portray Indigenous Peoples, places and communities who are underrepresented in digital media today.

Since the initiative’s launch in the Fall of 2020, Storyblocks has made the commitment to having 20 percent of its footage with people contain Black, Indigenous and people of color by 2022, with plans to expand the scope of the efforts in the future. The newest installment of the initiative hones in on the library’s need for more intersectional content, focusing primarily on increasing visibility of Indigenous communities in media through the curation and production of inclusive content. To ensure the collections support and co-create with the communities they represent, Storyblocks collaborated with Indigenous creative partners, including Josué Rivas, an Indigenous futurist and curator of Indigenous TikTok, and consulted with Indigenous led nonprofits to ensure that the groups represented had a crucial say in driving the narrative for the initiative.

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When asked to share his thoughts regarding the initiative Josué Rivas said, “Telling our own stories and reclaiming our narratives as Indigenous peoples is a crucial step towards decolonizing media. The camera has been used as a tool against Indigenous communities for a long time but I believe we are moving towards a paradigm shift where the camera can also be used as a tool for healing ourselves and our communities. These collections are a small step towards the liberation of our stories and an opportunity for other stock images to follow along. By proactively co-creating with us, Storyblocks has given us the platform to plant a seed for the stories of those we will never meet.”

Along with supporting these communities from a visual inclusion perspective, specific creators from the initiative opted to take their actions a step further by making monetary contributions towards the Indigenous groups that they collaborated with. For example, Nainoa Langer and Sam Potter chose to donate $5,000 and match up to $5,000 of fan donations towards the work of Kumano I Ke Ala. 

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