The Russian Film Archive Gosfilmondand the portal Cultura.RU have announced the start of a joint project called Open Collection. For this project, employees of the scientific department of the State Film will prepare more than 20 rare films for publication each month.
Elena Filatova, General Director of the State Film Fund of the Russian Federation, says that the Open Collection project will let audiences meet rare examples of Soviet and Russian cinema, many of which until recently could only be viewed by researchers until now.
In November 2016 the European Audiovisual Observatory has carried out a survey among the members of the Association des Cinémathèques Européennes. The objective was to assess the access to the film works in their collections in the context of education and research. 32 ACE members replied to the survey, representing over 1.1million film works.
The study “Access to film works in the collections of Film Heritage Institutions in the context of education and research” was part of a research project supported by the European Commission.” It can be downloaded HERE.
9 November 2016 – In 2012, the Orphan Works Directive has been adopted with the aim to unlock hundreds of thousands of objects preserved in Europe’s libraries, museums, archives and cinematheques, to digitse and publish them on portals like the European Film Gateway or Europeana. How has this objective been put into practise? The conference, jointly organised by FORWARD coordinator CINEMATEK and the Royal Library of Belgium, brings together professionals from the library and the audiovisual sector, policy makers and Commission’s representatives to discuss the impact of the Directive and how it has been transposed into national law.
In the afternoon, participants are invited to discover new orphan works tools: the FORWARD system to support the rights status assessment of audiovisual works, and the Royal Library’s orphan works database.
Venue: Royal Library of Belgium Date: 30th of November 2016, 9.30 – 16.30 h
You can access the programme and the registration form on the FORWARD website: http://tinyurl.com/z7oavr6 Registration is free of charge, but upon inscription. Please register before 25th of November.
15 May 2015 – How to facilitate access to audiovisual heritage whether it has been digitised or not? Digitisation is being carried on under the rationale of enabling access, but it seems to be only the very first step in making sure that our audiovisual heritage is available, known and alive. Digitising enables access rather in theory, not necessarily in practice.
During this one-day seminar film archivists, curators and experts in film and media education are presenting best practices and lessons learned in making 120 years of film heritage accessible and viewed.
15 August 2014 – In connection with the policy report”Towards an integrated approach to cultural heritage”, the Commission has published an overview of activities and funding programmes related to cultural heritage, including film heritage: Horizon2020, Europeana, Creative Europe and the Structural & Investment Funds, ERASMUS etc. It encourages cultural institutions to seize these opportunities and to work closely across Europe to ensure that cultural heritage contributes to more sustainable growth and social cohesion.
Europe as a political body needs to recognize the value of cultural heritage, beyond economical and financial legislations. It is a powerful instrument to build a shared identity and a sense of belonging amongst and between European citizens, as stated in the declaration “ A new narrative for Europe”.
20 July 2014 – Europeana published its strategic plan 2015-2020. One of the main goals for the upcoming years is to transform Europeana from portal to platform: Build a shared infrastructure, where people can reuse the material and interact with others. The priorities are to 1) improve metadata quality, 2) open up data, 3) create value for partners.
20 November 2013 – On 13 November, the final session of the stakeholder’s dialogue Licences for Europe took place in Brussels. The initiative was set up jointly by the Commissioners Neelie Kroes (Digital Agenda), Michel Barnier (Internal Market and Services), and Andrea Vassiliou (Education, Culture, Multilingualism and Youth) in February this year. The purpose of the four working groups was to deliver quick solutions for bringing more content online. ACE was member of working group 3 “Audiovisual Heritage Institutions” represented by Nicola Mazzanti. After 10 months of discussions ACE and rights holders representatives agreed on principles and procedures about digitising, restoring and making available European film heritage. The statement was signed in presence of the three Commissioners by ACE, the Federation of European Film Directors (FERA), the International Federation of Film Producers Associations (FIAPF), the Society of Audiovisual Authors (SAA).
19 November2013– Each year, the European Commission officially invites the Member States to send experts to the meeting of the Subgroup film heritage. Also invited are professional European and International associations from the audiovisual sector ( film archives, public sector broadcasters, rights holders organisations, distributors, experts in film literacy and media education etc.). Purpose of the meeting is to exchange information and discuss best practices related to film heritage in the European Union.
The meeting takes place at CINEMATEK, 9 Baron Horta, 1000 Brussels. Please note that attendance to the Cinema Experts Group meeting is by invitation only. More information and the agenda are available at the wesbite of the European Commission.
4 September 2013 – Cinémathèques as cultural institutions have a relatively short history, but need to quickly align themselves to radically changing technologies and user expectations. On the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the Deutsche Kinemathek – Museum für Film und Fernsehen (Berlin), the Conference “Collecting, preserving, presenting: What are Cinémathèques?” aims to analyse the origins, the development and the self- definition of Cinematheques and assess their social, political and aesthetical function: How can film museums and film archives remain significant places to create and promote film culture and knowledge? How can they contribute to a modern approach to film heritage?
Film archivists and experts will give lectures and discuss in round tables about archival standards, collection practices and their pitfalls, and, last but not least, modes of conveying and presenting their archival goods in exhibitions, screenings or via completely new channels.
30 May 2013 – Large scale digitsation projects, mainly undertaken by libraries and archives, are absolutely indispensable for the promotion of the knowledge society and public access to culture. These projects are all confronted with the challenge of copyright. To date, European Institutions don’t have a specific solution for mass-digitisation.
Over the past two years, three European initiatives have been set up in order to facilitate (large scale) digitisation and the access to works which are still in copyright: The Directive 2012/28/EU on Orphan Works, the Memorandum of Understanding on Works out-of-Commerce between libraires, publishers and collecting societies (2011), and the structured Stakeholder Dialogue “Licences for Europe”, a joint initiative launched by the Commisioners Barnier, Kroes and Vassiliou in February 2013.
Aim of the conference organised by CRIDS – Centre de Recherche sur Information, Droit et Société (Université de Namur) is to envisage the impact of these initiatives on the digitisation process and the availibility of works online. Nicola Mazzanti, ACE president and director of the Cinémathèque royale de Belgique, will speek about the necessity of digitisation in the audiovisuel sector.
The Russian Film Archive Gosfilmond and the portal Cultura.RU have announced the start of a joint project called Open Collection. For this project, employees of the scientific department of the State Film will prepare more than 20 rare films for publication each month.
