2008 AVANT-GARDE MASTERS GRANTS ANNOUNCED BY THE NFPF AND THE FILM FOUNDATION
Contact: Jeff Lambert (415-392-7291, lambert@filmpreservation.org)
San Francisco, CA (August 20, 2008)—Andy Warhol's Face (1965), starring Edie Sedgwick, and 18 other seminal avant-garde films will soon return to the silver screen in pristine new prints thanks to preservation awards from the National Film Preservation Foundation and The Film Foundation.
Of all Warhol's female stars probably none was as celebrated as Edie Sedgwick, the ultra-slim Santa Barbara heiress who figured in every sound film produced by Warhol's Factory between late March and early September 1965. Sedgwick, wrote the New York Times film critic Manhola Dargis, was a "dazzling film presence.…as beautiful and nervous as a hummingbird and just as alive." Face, which shows the star beginning her day, was originally conceived as an early segment of the 24-hour-long film The Poor Little Rich Girl Saga.
The preservation of Andy Warhol's Face and The Velvet Underground in Boston (1967) by the Andy Warhol Museum is one of five projects made possible through the 2008 Avant-Garde Masters Grants, a program funded by The Film Foundation and managed by the National Film Preservation Foundation. Also slated for preservation are two New York portraits by Rudy Burckhardt (Anthology Film Archives), conceptual artist Lawrence Weiner's Altered to Suit (1979) (Electronic Arts Intermix), five films by Abigail Child (Harvard Film Archive), and nine works by gay cinema pioneer Tom Chomont (UCLA Film & Television Archive). In total, $50,000 in preservation funds were distributed.
The Avant-Garde Masters Grants are the first awards targeting the preservation of American experimental film. The program encourages archives to work directly with filmmakers to save works significant to the development of the avant-garde in America. Since initiated in 2003, the grants have preserved films by Kenneth Anger, Samuel Beckett, Bruce Conner, Hollis Frampton, Ernie Gehr, Larry Gottheim, George and Mike Kuchar, Gregory Markopoulos, Jonas Mekas, Tom Palazzolo, Larry Rivers, Carolee Schneemann, and Frank Stauffacher. The full roster of projects is posted on the NFPF Web site, www.filmpreservation.org.
The National Film Preservation Foundation is the nonprofit organization created by the U.S. Congress to help save America's film heritage. The NFPF has supported film preservation in 45 states and the District of Columbia and has helped save more than 1,340 films and collections. The NFPF is the charitable affiliate of the National Film Preservation Board of the Library of Congress.
The Film Foundation is a nonprofit organization established in 1990 by Martin Scorsese. The foundation is dedicated to protecting and preserving motion picture history, and provides substantial annual support for preservation and restoration projects at the nation's major film archives. Since its inception, the foundation has been instrumental in raising awareness of the urgent need to preserve films and has helped to save nearly 500 motion pictures. Joining Scorsese on the board are: Woody Allen, Paul Thomas Anderson, Wes Anderson, Francis Ford Coppola, Clint Eastwood, Curtis Hanson, Peter Jackson, Ang Lee, George Lucas, Alexander Payne, Robert Redford and Steven Spielberg. The Film Foundation is aligned with the Directors Guild of America whose President and Secretary-Treasurer serve on the foundation's board.
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