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The Moving Image 4.2 (2004) 145-149



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Symposium: Tenth Anniversary Celebration of the Restoration Department at the Fachhochschule für Technik und Wirtschaft. Berlin, November 22, 2003.

On November 22, 2003, the Restoration Department at the College for Technology and Economics(Fachhochschule für Technik und Wirtschaft, or FHTW) celebrated its tenth anniversary with a symposium. The anniversary began with greetings from the president of the FHTW, Prof. Dr. Herbert Grüner, and Prof. Dr. Matthias Knaut, the chair of the Design Faculty. There followed five presentations by renowned personalities in restoration. Mark-Paul Meyer, conservator and curator at the Netherlands Filmmuseum, provided the highlight with his presentation called "The Future of Film Preservation." In laying out some of the mistakes that the field of moving image preservation had committed in the past, he outlined the possibilities of future approaches to challenges faced by archives and their personnel. His criticism included the religion of reproduction that film archivists [End Page 145] had adopted in the past, the faithful habit of continuous, diligent copying activities onto what were believed to be new and "better" film stocks, all of this safely within the paradigm of the reproducibility of film. He directed attention to the fact that most funding currently available is focused on projects aimed at digitizing cultural patrimony, yet this creates a situation where the past serves as a cautionary aid. Under the heading of minimizing costs, archives focused on reproduction to the detriment of all else: color films copied in black-and-white, 35mm material reduced to 16mm, silent apertures cropped to sound aperture, and, most grievously, original material methodically destroyed after suboptimal reproduction.

Today, such practices are generally thought unacceptable and counterproductive, and film is considered as a text with its own inviolable wholeness, aesthetics, technology, and context. Meyer pointed out that, for example, Kodak stocks from 1913 are of different chemical composition than stocks from 1925, yet no scientific investigation has been undertaken to investigate this evolution. Only within the last few years has research taken a more scientific approach in our field, with surviving films gaining status as original objects. His plea for improved restoration techniques included taking the specific qualities of each object into consideration, stressing sensible choices, such as color simulation in generating film prints, while using black-and-white stocks in preservation elements due to their longevity. Along these lines he cautioned and welcomed the digital technologies, stressed the grave dangers of repeating the same sins committed in the past—always at great cost to the funding community—and urged a well-considered use of their vast potential.

Interesting moments also occurred during the discussion. As the roundtable sought to define the job market's expectations toward diploma-certified restorers, it was noted that a wide spectrum of diverse knowledge was required; the restorer was to personify professionalism while maintaining personal enthusiasm. Prof. Keller-Kempas gave an apt description of the restorer as a spokesperson of the object, which led to an animated discussion about the division of competencies in the field, especially focusing on defining the scope of a restorer's responsibilities. Disagreement reigned concerning a restorer's aptitude and recognition as a scientist with full license to determine protocol and procedure, in contrast to the more traditional notion designating the restorer as an executive technician, operating at the behest of research scientists/academics.

The anniversary celebration continued in a less structured format with various demonstrations and tours offered throughout the buildings and labs of the four restoration programs. This was a great opportunity to view the equipment and enjoy insights into specialized procedures of analysis, cleaning, and repair of very diverse sorts of materials. It also provided a chance to interrogate the students concerning their concerns, contentment, and enjoyments. All students exhibited great enthusiasm when questioned about their specific projects and the methodologies employed. On the negative side were the complaints common to all students: excessive workload, subjects considered irrelevant yet demanding, and, specific to this course of studies, the fragmented campuses of the...

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