For five years now, one of the great film resources in America has been unjustly imprisoned, boxed up and sitting in the corridors of a film storage facility in Hamlin, Pennsylvania. It's a scandal, a tragedy, and an enormous disservice to film scholarship. In a recent e-mail, Mary Corliss, creator and curator of the Film Stills Archive at the Museum of Modern Art, the source of images for countless film-related books and publications (Corliss is also the stills editor for both Roger Ebert's "Great Movies" books), brings us up to date on the struggle to make this invaluable treasure accessible again:
I have been remiss in sharing the final chapter of the [National Labor Relations Board] vs. MoMA saga with all of you who supported me and Terry Geesken after our abrupt lay-offs and the closing of the Film Stills Archive in January 2002. This September, I received a document signed by the three Republicans appointed to the Washington office of the NLRB. (The Democratic minority on the panel was not represented). In their ruling, they not only fully agreed with MoMA's arguments; they reversed those points that the judge in the NLRB trial had decided in our favor.Essentially, they found MoMA's decision to close the Film Stills Archive to be solely the result of the Museum’s need to reduce services and spaces during its $850 million expansion, and not a personal retaliation for our union activities. That verdict represents the end of the legal battle.
But the struggle to keep the Stills Archive alive does not, cannot end there. Since MoMA argued that the Archive was closed for temporary lack of space, it follows that, when even more space was made available, the Archive would reopen. That was Terry’s and my understanding when we took a low severence in order to have recall rights to our jobs of 34 and 18 years, respectively, returning when the Archive reopened. In other words, the future of the Archive bore no relevance to the disposition of the NLRB case.
The renovation of the main Museum was completed two years ago, and this week MoMA unveiled its 63,000 sq. ft. Lewis B. and Dorothy Cullman Education and Research Building. Surprise, surprise: the Film Stills Archive is not a part of it. There are no plans I know of to set aside, in any of its spaces, the 2500 sq. ft that the Archive requires--not in the renovated Museum, nor the new education center, nor the Museum's building in Queens.To make your feelings known about this situation, contact director Glenn Lowry at the Museum of Modern Art:It is nearly five years since MoMA made the collection inaccessible to scholars, historians, authors and journalists. Those 4 million-plus stills, documenting the visual history of world cinema, continue to remain in cold storage in Pennsylvania [in a facility called the Celeste Bartos Film Preservation Center], untended and unused. Unused, I might add, except by MoMA curator Steven Higgins, who with great hubris embroidered his scant text with images from the Stills Archive in "Still Moving,"a book that highlights the Museum's Film and Media collections and resources. (Resource for whom, one might ask?) An exhibition of stills used in that publication are also on display at Hermes in New York.
As always, I remain grateful to all of you who took the time to write letters and articles, and offered words of support and encouragement. Change is always possible (the midterm elections are encouraging evidence), and perhaps, one day MoMA management will be without the leadership of Glenn Lowry. May all of the Museum's Archives endure.
Best regards,
Mary
11 West 53 Street
New York, NY 10019-5497
(212) 708-9400
Or write: archives@moma.org
I had no idea. I heard about the archive from the introduction of Roger's Great Movies II book and thought how wonderful it was. I'm extremely dissapointed with MoMA.
Dismal. Another black mark against MoMA. Though its interesting to consider the issue in light of this post I just read.
I am saddened by what has happened to the Stills Archive. I worked with Mary Corliss as a student volunteer at MoMA not too long after the Archive was established.
Since Mary is my sister in law, I guess any comment I make may be considered biased. Well this surely can't be, the State of NY under the Governorship of George Pataki gave MOMA $5 million to create a space for the collection at the museum. I personally wrote a letter to the governor asking why the space had not been built or the collection brought back, I received a reply. To me the reply was and still is a slap in the face to all NY taxpayers. I as well as all NYers should look into this matter since MOMA a tax exempt entity receives many grants from the state.
Though the Thompson post linked to above refers to an exemption for scholars using clips from actual films--and by extension, one could argue, frame enlargements from actual films. Correct me if I'm wrong, but the film stills in general--and I assume those that make up much of the archive--are publicity photographs shot on set, which may approximate but don't replicate shots from the films they illustrate, as they aren't struck from a print (or grabbed from a DVD) of the actual film.
Paul: You're correct. Film stills -- of the sort that make up the MoMa Archive -- are high quality still images shot by professional photographers on the set, most for publicity purposes. That's what makes the Archive itself so much more valuable than mere frame enlargements. These images are works of art unto themselves, in many cases. Many are approximations of actual shots in the films, but may have been taken during rehearsal, or between takes, or posed for at some other time. The detail -- especially in some of the older photos -- can be astonishing, far greater than you'd ever get from a frame blow-up. The art of the production still is a realm of its own!
Well, "more valuable than frame enlargements" to the study of publicity stills, I'd say. But it depends on the book or article we're talking about, right? Bordwell/Thompson's Film Art, say, couldn't work with stills, and the authors were right to lobby to get their hands on actual images from the films. MomMA's stills are pretty indispensable for cultural or industry histories though (or something on art of film stills or publicity materials). But if you're writing about films as discrete works of art--say, doing an Opening Shot entry--publicity stills are of little use relative to images from the film itself, right?
Anyhow, choosing between the two isn't necessary. Everything should be accessible. I think what makes this case particularly frustrating is that it's MoMA, an organization largely responsible for the serious consideration of film, getting in the way of film scholarship or journalism--as opposed to a nasty media conglomerate blithely unaware of the existence of scholars ... making this stuff available can only help fulfill MoMA's mission (at least as far as I understand it, from Haidee Wasson's Museum Movies). Why they don't is perplexing.
Paul: Yes, you're right. When I used the word "valuable," I probably should have used something more like "rare" instead. As Krisin Thompson points out in her post (link above), frame enlargements have become much more accessible since the advent of DVDs. (And, of course, quoting directly from frames in the film itself is preferable when discussing the mechanics of a particular shot or scene.) But the Stills Archive represents a special part of film history, and those images (reproducible in much greater detail than frame captures) offer something unique.
I have followed this long journey with my friend Mary Corliss and the facts of these events are extremely frustrating. How an organization like MOMA can behave so irresponsibly is difficult to understand. What should be a joyous event visiting the MOMA today has been extremely scarred by the museum's (management) treatment to the archives and two dedicated curators.
Hello: although I am late to this blog, what is "wrong" with a PA archive? And, where is it, precisely? I live in the adjacent town to Hamlin PA and would like to know.
Art
JE: The main problem is that the "archive" isn't available to anybody. It's just a bunch of boxes in storage.