Living Archives was begun in 1976, and incorporated in November of that year. Its purpose was to fund films, which in the ordinary course of commercial programming and distribution, were not likely to happen. These would be films of the real world, not just re-enactments and would embody the lives, public and private of painters, musicians, dancers, poets, scientists, politicians, actors, and businessmen – anyone capable of interesting and original expression. By funding and preserving this kind of filmmaking we help pass along a new kind of history, which might be made accessible in any format. To make certain it survives, preservation is crucial. We must examine all methods of safekeeping and maintain necessary storage facilities. We must understand new technologies and use them to protect our fragile records of which we may often be the sole custodians.
And finally we must join libraries, museums, universities, and programmers and be ready to share our materials and encourage full public access wherever possible. If we can do this in the face of a television journalism content with quick-time interviews and hollow public statements, a technology that continually erases its stored materials to save money and storage space, and finally an industry that thinks only of the consumer market for the development of such image recording devices as will be responsible for whatever gets passed on of our history. . . if we do any of these things it will be an important and wonderful step. If we could do all of them I would think this an incredibly worthwhile enterprise.
-D A Pennebaker 1976
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And finally we must join libraries, museums, universities, and programmers and be ready to share our materials and encourage full public access wherever possible. If we can do this in the face of a television journalism content with quick-time interviews and hollow public statements, a technology that continually erases its stored materials to save money and storage space, and finally an industry that thinks only of the consumer market for the development of such image recording devices as will be responsible for whatever gets passed on of our history. . . if we do any of these things it will be an important and wonderful step. If we could do all of them I would think this an incredibly worthwhile enterprise.
-D A Pennebaker 1976
