Dear Anna,

I can point you to two databases that were created for this purpose but are no longer accessible.

There used to be a database at www.24-25.fr but this website is no longer active do to an irreversible server crash. You can see a snapshot of it here: https://web.archive.org/web/20140302203010/http://24-25.fr/ It was compiled by a group comprising almost all the distribution cooperatives in France and was to include also all museum and cinematheques with film collections when the project collapsed.

The architecture was based on another database of media art archves that is also unfortunately out of commission though you can still consult the home page: http://www.gama-gateway.eu/

These databases are inactive because they were designed to migrate information from each organization's online database and funnel all the data and metadata into an index that would allow you to search for any film or filmmaker and find results in every archive. However, unlike a search engine for best plane fares that simply answers each query with a specialized search, the information was compiled regularly on the database server which required regular maintenance and complex updating because each individual database is so different. State funding dried up and no one group could manage running the index.

As it stands now, each organization has its own database but there is no community database.

Almost every country has an archive of experimental production, to name just two examples the archives of The Balázs Béla Studio (BBS) or the Serbian alternative film archive http://www.dksg.rs/afc-redakcija. There are also extensive collections in Asia but again you will have to consult each collection individually. There are many resources available, such as this list, but for now still no database of all archives.

Good luck,
Pip Chodorov



At 11:12 +0100 21/02/16, Anna Briggs wrote:
I am writing to ask where I might possibly find an index of experimental film and/or video art collections and archives. I am particularly looking for archives in non-Western countries, to investigate as part of a thesis chapter about the experimental paradigm. I have consulted lists of films archives compiled by the International Federation of Film Archives, the Association of Moving Image Archivists and the Library of Congress, but I wonder if there is a more specialised database.

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