Maine’s Home Movies: Treasures from Northeast Historic Film
Other Amateur Films/Home Movies/Films of the Everyday:
NYC 1911/MOMA - version with ambient
NYC 1911/MOMA - version with music accompaniment
Berlin - Symphony of a Metropolis (1927) | by Walther Ruttmann
Center for Home Movies films listing
Reviews of Home Movie Exhibitions:
The Artful Amateurism of Home Movies/MOMA exhibition 2019-2020
Review by Susannah Gruder: “In MoMA’s first exhibition composed entirely of home movies, visitors are placed into the perspective of these amateur filmmakers, ever so often stumbling upon a choice moment of intimacy.”
At MoMA, Home Movies That Reveal the World/NYT
Review by Ben Kenigsberg: “ 'Private Lives Public Spaces’ is a thought-provoking show of neglected footage from the museum’s collection. With little background information available, you get to play historian and detective.”
Books:
Amateur Movie Making: Aesthetics of the Everyday in New England Film 1915-1960.
A volume of essays edited by Martha J. McNamara and Karan Sheldon, on selections from the collections of Northeast Historic Film. 2017. Alice T. Friedman (Foreword). Contributors: Dino Everett, Libby Bischof, Justin Wolff, Whit Stillman, Karen Gracy, Charles Tepperman, Jennifer Neptune, Christopher Reed, Christopher Castiglia, Brian Jacobson, Martha White, Melissa Dollman, Janna Jones
A compelling regional and historical study that transforms our understanding of film history, Amateur Movie Making demonstrates how amateur films and home movies stand as testaments to the creative lives of ordinary people, enriching our experience of art and the everyday. Here we encounter the lyrical and visually expressive qualities of films produced in New England between 1915 and 1960 and held in the collections of Northeast Historic Film, a moving image repository and study center that was established to collect, preserve, and interpret the audiovisual record of northern New England. Contributors from diverse backgrounds examine the visual aesthetics of these films while placing them in their social, political, and historical contexts. Each discussion is enhanced by technical notes and the analyses are also juxtaposed with personal reflections by artists who have close connections to particular amateur filmmakers. These reflections reanimate the original private contexts of the home movies before they were recast as objects of study and artifacts of public history.
