Film Studies blog

I attended the 18th annual Visible Evidence Conference at the Tisch School of the Arts, New York University, August 11-14, 2011. VE18 brought together over one hundred students and scholars of documentary film from all over the world to watch films and hear papers about every aspect of non-fiction documentary from German television and animation to Queer politics and travelogues.

Despite the usual technological glitches and approximations of being on schedule, most of the presentations I visited were well-attended.  My favorite events included Concordia University’s Randolph Jordan’s paper on sound manipulation of the World Trade Center attacks  and a screening of ‘A Boatload of Wild Irishmen’, MacDara O’Curraidhim and Brian Winston’s documentary about the filmmaker Robert Flaherty.

‘Hold still, Hollywood’ : the photography of Buddy Longworth

The Fine Arts Library has acquired one of the earliest collections of Hollywood promotional and publicity stills: Hold still, Hollywood by Bertram (Buddy) Longworth (Los Angeles : Ivan Deach Jr., 1937). Longworth worked for both Universal and MGM and ran his own studio where he printed and sold portraits as well as unusual composite and montage photographs. Our copy is one of 500 ‘special’ editions housed in a custom-designed clamshell box with the owner’s name embossed within (in this case, to Ray Enright, the director) and includes an inscription from Longworth to Enright.

This composite portrait of the actress Ruby Keeler is emblematic of the charming, thoroughly modern, and downright experimental photographs that distinguish Buddy Longworth’s work.