Film preservation, or film restoration, describes a series of ongoing efforts among film historians, archivists, museums, cinematheques, and non-profit organizations to rescue decaying film stock and preserve the images they contain. In the widest sense, preservation assures that a movie will continue to exist in as close to its original form as possible.
The British Film Institute (BFI) is a film and television charitable organisation which promotes and preserves film-making and television in the United Kingdom. The BFI uses funds provided by the National Lottery to encourage film production, distribution, and education. It is sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, and partially funded under the British Film Institute Act 1949.
The Mitchell & Kenyon film company was a pioneer of early commercial motion pictures based in Blackburn in Lancashire, England, at the start of the 20th century. They were originally best known for minor contributions to early fictional narrative film and Boer War dramatisation films, but the discovery in 1994 of a hoard of film negatives led to restoration of the Mitchell & Kenyon Collection, the largest surviving collection of early non-fiction actuality films in the world. This collection provides a fresh view of Edwardian era Britain and is an important resource for historians.
The Museum of the Moving Image (MOMI) was a museum of the history of cinema technology and media sited below Waterloo Bridge in London. It was opened on 15 September 1988 by Prince Charles and at the time, was the world's largest museum devoted entirely to cinema and television. The museum formed part of the cultural complex on the South Bank of the River Thames. MOMI was mainly funded by private subscription and operated by the British Film Institute. MOMI was closed in 1999, initially on a supposedly temporary basis, and with the intention of its being relocated to Jubilee Gardens nearby. Its permanent closure was announced in 2002.
The International Federation of Film Archives was founded in Paris in 1938 by the Cinémathèque Française, the Reichsfilmarchiv in Berlin, the British Film Institute and the Museum of Modern Art in New York City.
The National Center for Jewish Film is a non-profit motion picture archive, distributor, and resource center. It houses the largest collection of Jewish-themed film and video outside of Israel. Its mission is to collect, restore, preserve, catalogue, and exhibit films with artistic and educational value relevant to the Jewish experience, and to disseminate these materials to the widest possible audience.
Jane Wilson and Louise WilsonRA Elect are British artists who work together as a sibling duo. Jane and Louise Wilson's art work is based in video, film and photography. They are YBA artists who were nominated for the Turner Prize in 1999.
The North East Film Archive (NEFA) is a not-for-profit organisation which exists to collect, preserve and provide access to film, television and other moving image material, across Durham, Cumbria, Northumberland, Tyne and Wear and the Tees Valley.
Ernest Lindgren was a British film archivist and writer.
Patrick Keiller is a British film-maker, writer and lecturer.
The conservation and restoration of new media art is the study and practice of techniques for sustaining new media art created using from materials such as digital, biological, performative, and other variable media.
An orphan film is a motion picture work that has been abandoned by its owner or copyright holder. The term can also sometimes refer to any film that has suffered neglect.
Sir John Akomfrah is a British artist, writer, film director, screenwriter, theorist and curator of Ghanaian descent, whose "commitment to a radicalism both of politics and of cinematic form finds expression in all his films".
Iain Forsyth and Jane Pollard are British artists and filmmakers.
BFI Southbank is the leading repertory cinema in the UK, specialising in seasons of classic, independent and non-English language films.
The Association of European Cinematheques is an affiliation of 49 European national and regional film archives founded in 1991. Its role is to safeguard the European film heritage and make these rich audiovisual records collected and preserved by the various film archives accessible to the public. ACE is a regional branch of FIAF Fédération Internationale des Archives du Film / International Federation of Film Archives. ACE members are non-profit institutions committed to the FIAF Code of Ethics.
The BFI Gallery was the British Film Institute's contemporary art gallery dedicated to artists' moving image housed within BFI Southbank, the BFI's flagship venue in London, previously known as the National Film Theatre.
Unlocking Film Heritage (UFH) was one of the biggest film digitisation projects ever undertaken and it encompassed the BFI National Archive together with national and regional audiovisual archival institutions in United Kingdom. Between 2013–2017 around 10,000 titles, capturing 120 years of Great Britain on film, were digitised and made free-to-access in a variety of ways. Many archival clips can be watched for free online via BFI Player.
Vanessa Toulmin is an English academic specialising in popular culture. She is Professor and Director of City Culture and Public Engagement at the University of Sheffield, and founded the National Fairground and Circus Archive (NFCA) at the University of Sheffield. She is chair of the Morecambe Winter Gardens Preservation Trust.
