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Executive Committee

The annual Assembly of FIAF, which was held in Mo i Rana (Norway) on May 31st, 1991, has witnessed the election of its Executive Committee, which will lead the Federation towards the much expected Centennial of Film, thus taking over a crucial responsibility in the development and diffusion of the principles and practice of film preservation. Each member has agreed to send a brief resume of his/her activity in the field.

Hoos Blotkamp
was born in Utrecht (Holland) in 1943. She studied art-history, specializing in 'modern times' (supposedly the era from 1850 onwards) and her subjects were: Duchamp and Bergson, electronic music, chance in the arts. She was seven years curator at the Central Museum in Utrecht making exhibitions, educational projects and publications on art, architecture and even one on film. She was then seven years head of the department of Visual Arts, Architecture and Design at the Ministry of Culture, getting thoroughly acquainted with bureaucracy, politics and cultural policy (whatever that may be). Computer-freak and having (to her own surprise) an image of 'competent manager', she is nevertheless deeply attached to the fields of culture and their well-being; she has now been several years in love with the newly detected area of early cinema.

José Manuel Costa
est né en 1953. Cours d'ingénieur à l'Université de Lisboa puis collaborateur de la Cinemateca Portuguesa dès 1975 où il coordonne la programmation de 1980 à 1987, tout en poursuivant des études sur la conservation des films, notamment à Londres et Paris. Aujourd'hui il est responsable des archives de la Cinémathèque où il dirige l'édification de l'ANIM (Archive Nationale des Images en Mouvement). Il est aussi président du Comité exécutif du Projet Lumière (Programme MEDIA de la Communauté européenne) et de l'ACCE (Association des Cinémathèques de la Communauté Européenne). Il est l'auteur de monographies sur D.W. Griffith, Robert Flaherty, Joris Ivens, le cinéma chinois... et enseigne l'histoire du cinéma à l'Université de Lisboa.

Robert Daudelin
est né en 1939. Critique et animateur de ciné-clubs, fondateur et rédacteur en chef de la revue Objectif, publiée à Montréal de 1960 à 1967, il a été aussi directeur adjoint du Festival international du film de Montréal de 1963 à 1967. Il dirige la Cinémathèque québécoise depuis 1972 et siège au Comité directeur de la FIAF depuis 1975: comme Secrétaire-général de 1979 à 1985 et comme Président élu à Lisbonne en 1989. Il a participé à de nombreux symposiums internationaux (Unesco, Agence de coopération culturelle et technique, etc.). Nombreuses publications. En 1987, il a réalisé un documentaire de long métrage consacré au musicien américain Lee Konitz: Konitz, portrait of the artist as a saxophonist.

Jan-Christopher Horak
was born 1951 in Germany and is US citizen since 1957. He graduated as B.A. in History and Communications at the University of Delaware (1973), as M.S. in Film at Boston University (1975) and got his PhD. in Communications in Münster, Germany (1984). That same year he joined George Eastman House, Film Department, of which he is now senior Curator of Film. He is a Professor at the University of Rochester since 1985. His book publications include: Film und Foto der zwanziger Jahre (1979), Helmar Lerski - Lichtbildner. Fotographien und Filme 1910-1947 (1983), Anti Nazi Filme der deutschsprachigen Emigration von Hollywood (1984), Fluchtpunt Hollywood. Eine Dokumentation zur Filmemigration nach 1933 (1984, 1986), The Dream Merchants (1989), Early American Avant-Garde Cinema (forthcoming 1994), and over eighty articles in various national and international journals.

Clyde Jeavons
is aged 54. Curator of the National Film and Television Archive, UK, since 1990 and FIAF Executive member since 1991 (elected Treasurer in 1993), he was formerly Head of Film and TV Acquisitions at the NFA (1969 - 1975), Deputy-Curator, NFA (1975 - 1985), British cinema consultant to the London Film Festival (1986 - 1989) and founder of 'British in Berlin' (1990). He is a member of the Executive Committee of the Lumière Project; of the Archives group, Council of Europe; the National Council for UK Centenary of Cinema; and Chairman of the BFI Archival Achievement Award Panel. His current FIAF responsibilities include the development of a Training Group and the organisation of the Legal Deposit Symposium at the Bologna Congress in 1994. He is the author of Pictorial Histories of Westerns, War Films, and Sex in the Movies; British Film-Makers of the 80s.

Jorge Nieto
First as dedicated fan, later as journalist, critic, professor and film-maker - from boom operating to writing, producing and directing- and lately as archivist, the movies have always been near the center of his activity. The perils and pleasures of film preservation became his main concern when in the seventies he founded and directed a project aimed at supporting and upgrading pioneer archival efforts dating from the fifties. Fundación Patrimonio Fílmico Colombiano was created in 1986 as a follow-up of that project, and he was appointed Curator, responsible for the technical direction where he continues to head the policy-making and work of all the departments involved in film and video acquisition, preservation, cataloguing, documentation, historical research, diffusion and access. His recently published book Tiempos del Olympia is an illustrated chronicle of the Italian pioneers who established the cinema in Colombia. Vladimir Opela
was born in 1938 and studied natural sciences at the University of J.E. Purkyne Brno. Co-founder of the Czech film-club movement in 1957, he joined Ceskoslovensky Filmovy Ustav in 1965 where he was Head of Acquisition and Preservation until 1989 when he became Head of the Film Archive and Curator. He is the Director-Curator of Národní Filmovy Archiv of the Czech Republic since its establishment in July 1992. A member of several national bodies (Board for the Drafting of the Archival Law, Central Censorship Commission, Censorship Commission for AV materials, Society of Film Technicians and Managers), he has been a member of the FIAF Executive since 1991 and of the FIAF Cataloguing Commission since 1987, for which he published his research on Early Film Production Companies and their logos. He was also active in the FIAF Preservation Commission from 1979 to 1990.

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Eva Orbanz
was born in Berlin in 1942 where she worked at the German Film and Television School (Deutsche Film- und Fernsehakademie) from 1967 to 1972. She was a guest student at the Cinémathèque Royale de Belgique in Brussels and at the British Film Institute, London. Since 1973, she is employed by the Stiftung Deutsche Kinemathek, first as Coordinator and, since 1985 as head of the Film Department. Her publications include: Wolfgang Staudte (1977), Journey to a legend and back. The British Realistic Film (1977), etc.. She has been a member of the FIAF Executive since 1981 and Secretary-General since 1988.

José Maria Prado
was born in 1952 and graduated in Interior Design. During the seventies, he collaborated with different film magazines both in Spain and other countries and worked as programmer for Radio Nacional de España and as a free-lance graphic designer. He began working for Filmoteca Española in 1976 and was in charge of programming until 1987 when he was appointed Deputy-Director. He became Director of Filmoteca Española in 1988. During the last fifteen years, he has been a consultant for several international film festivals such as Pesaro, Rotterdam and San Sebastian, among others.

Steven Ricci
was born in Berkeley, California in 1952. He is Head of Research and Study at the UCLA Film and Television Archive where he is responsible for developing programs which widen access to the Archive's collections and oversees its educational publications, workshops, seminars and film retrospectives. Since 1990 he has coordinated the Interactive Technologies Analysis Project, an international effort to evaluate the use of new technologies for media research, teaching and publication. Since receiving advanced degrees in film history and theory from the UCLA Film Department in 1980, Ricci has accumulated wide experience as a programmer and conference organizer. He frequently collaborates with Italian initiatives and has curated retrospectives for the film festivals in Pesaro, Venice and Salsomaggiore. He has recently completed a study of Italian film from 1922 to 1938 and has also published essays on both American genre and independent cinemas.

Guy-Claude Rochemont
est né en Martinique (Antilles françaises). Après des études secondaires classiques, il a obtenu des licences d'allemand et d'anglais à la Faculté des Lettres de Toulouse. Professeur. Actif dans le mouvement ciné-club dès les années 50 et critique dans la presse quotidienne provinciale. Membre fondateur de la Cinémathèque de Toulouse au côté de Raymond Borde, il en a été le Secrétaire général pendant plus de vingt ans et a pris une part prépondérante dans la mise en place du Centre de documentation de l'archive. Il est Président de la Cinémathèque de Toulouse depuis 1990.

Roger Smither
was born in Istanbul, Turkey, in 1948. After obtaining a BA degree in History at Cambridge University, he joined the Imperial War Museum as a film cataloguer in July 1970. From 1973 to 1976 he was in charge of the implementation of APPARAT, a computer system used to catalogue and maintain technical records for the Museum's film archive, and co-wrote the Museum's Film Cataloguing Handbook. In 1977, he became Keeper of the Department of Information Retrieval with responsibilities extending over collection management and other computer applications throughout the Museum. He became Keeper of the Museum's Department of Film - one of the two national film archives in the United Kingdom - in September 1990.
Roger Smither has served as a member of FIAF's Cataloguing Commission since 1979 and has contributed to several Commission projects including two Studies on Computer Usage in Film Archives.

Ivan Trujillo Bolio
was born in Tabasco, Mexico, in 1954. He graduated in biology at the National Autonomous University of Mexico where he also studied film-making. He joined Filmoteca de la UNAM in 1980 in charge of the scientific films' section, then as chief of the Programming section (1984) and is currently Director of Dirección General de Actividades Cinematográficas of UNAM. He is a member of several international associations related to the production and promotion of scientific films and video. For the last 10 years, he has been dedicated to the production of wildlife documentaries (he realized several films himself) and to the promotion of scientific cinema in Mexico.