Museum Movies

by Wasson, Haidee

• ISBN13: 9780520241312
• ISBN10: 0520241312
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2005-06-01
• Publisher: Univ of California Pr

Summary

Haidee Wasson provides a rich cultural history of cinema's transformation from a passing amusement to an enduring art form by mapping the creation of the Film Library of the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), New York, established in 1935. The first North American film archive and museum, the film library pioneered an expansive moving image network, comprising popular, abstract, animated, American, Canadian, and European films. More than a repository, MoMA circulated these films nationally and internationally, connecting the modern art museum to universities, libraries, women's clubs, unions, archives, and department stores. Under the aegis of the museum, cinema also changed. Like books, paintings, and photographs, films became discrete objects, integral to thinking about art, history, and the politics of modern life.

Author Biography

Haidee Wasson is Assistant Professor of Cinema Studies at Concordia University, Montreal

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations	ix
Acknowledgments	xi
Making Cinema a Modern Art	1	(31)
Mannered Cinema/Mobile Theaters: Film Exhibition, 16mm, and the New Audience Ideal	32	(36)
The Mass Museology of the Modern	68	(42)
An Awkward and Dangerous Task: The Film Library Takes Shape	110	(39)
Rearguard Exhibition: The Film Library's Circulating Programs	149	(36)
Enduring Legacies	185	(10)
Appendix: Film Programs of the Museum of Modern Art, 1934--1949	195	(14)
Notes	209	(66)
Bibliography	275	(24)
Index	299