The Eye Filmmuseum in Amsterdam is a venerable FIAF member, renowned for its restorations of silent films, for its links to training courses for audiovisual archivists in Dutch universities, and for its publications, organises an annual international conference on archival issues. This year it was, for the first time, streamed on the internet. I subscribed to it and was profoundly impressed by the range and quality of the papers and presenters.
Two papers – presented by non-Australians – were about the films and publications of Arthur and Corinne Cantrill. Another paper, about the Desmet colour process, referenced Dominic Case’s SMPTE article about the colouring of For the Term of His Natural Life. Papers explored how archives should probe the digital horizons of restoration as well as recognising and celebrating the analogue materiality of film. Plenty of technical and ethical issues in those themes.
The list of conference papers can be found at:
The virtual conference – the recordings of the presentations – can be accessed at
https://vimeo.com/showcase/EyeInternationalConference2025
password: The_Colour_Fantastic_Revisited: (be sure to include the colon at the end)
Not only was the conference well designed for the virtual participant, it was seamlessly staged. Even if you can’t watch three days of papers, I recommend that you jut dip into it.
Ray
