In November 2004, over twenty years after that first conference, the AAMOD worked together with the Department of Communications and Entertainment of Rome University III to organize a seminar addressing these and other questions (Modelli di archivi audiovisivi).² The preparatory phase of this initiative involved the completion by each of the 60 invited participants of a questionnaire with various questions on ten different themes.

The subjects addressed in the questionnaire and the subsequent discussions are as follows:

1.      The definition of film based on the one formulated in the early 1990s by the International Federation of Film Archives (FIAF)

2.      The film as product, historical document and work of art

3.      Audiovisual material and multimedia

4.      Supports, conservation and restoration

5.      The use and reuse of film

6.      Rights of ownership and intellectual property

7.      The proliferation of audiovisual archives

8.      Institutional and legislative frameworks in the sector of audiovisual archives

9.      Training with respect to audiovisual archives

10.  Tools of description and access for the audiovisual heritage

The seminar of 2004 was conceived and organized on the basis of an original methodology to serve not as a traditional meeting for a handful of experts but rather as an authentic survey involving not only experts in the sectors of archives, libraries and records management but also contemporary historians, historians of cinema, creators of cinematographic and multimedia works, restorers, documentalists, media consultants, television programmers, IT experts, students, and legislators.³

The results of the 2004 initiative⁴ gave rise to a highly varied and interesting initial set of ideas and proposals providing a wealth of stimuli for further examination and discussion. The seminar was in fact conceived as part of a broader project, acting as the first stage of a complex programme of study and debate on all the issues regarding the handling of and access to audiovisual materials at the national level.

The subsequent stage of this project was another seminar, jointly organized by the AAMOD and the State Record Library (SRL) and Audiovisual Museum, held on 14 December 2005 in Rome at the SRL (Un sistema di archivi audiovisivi: criticità, linee d’azione e proposte). This new and highly structured initiative was launched and developed also on the basis of stimuli and suggestions from Massimo Pistacchi (director of the SRL), Gabriele D’Autilia (director of the AAMOD), Ansano Giannarelli and the author (directors and supervisors of the seminar), together with Francesco Aquilanti.

The following subjects were addressed at the seminar by experts:

·        The legislative framework in Italy and the European Union as regards audiovisual archives (M. C. Sotgiu)

·        The state of regional and local legislation on audiovisual archives (V. Bazzocchi)

·        The law on legal custody in Italy and Europe (A.M. Mandillo)

·        Models of audiovisual archives, their management and the associated professional skills (A. Giannarelli, C. Angeletti)

·        Cataloguing, standards, models, and training requirements (A. Pagliarulo and L. Cortini, C. Magliano)

·        Online access to data and metadata (G. Bruno, F. Baldi)

·        Intellectual property and economic ownership of audiovisual material (A. Miccichè)

·        Analog and digital restoration, decision-making criteria and training requirements (M. Musumeci, L. D’Aleo)

A specific methodology was again adopted in order to address these issues. The experts were asked to prepare an overview of the present situation for each of the subjects. The synopses accordingly drawn up on the subjects indicated were discussed during the seminar together with scholars and the representatives of institutions, film libraries and audiovisual archives, who in turn provided short papers, suggestions, and proposals for supplementary studies. Particular interested attached to the addresses delivered by Gigliola Fioravanti (director of the CFLR – Centre of reprography, binding and restoration) on the experience of “traditional” archives in handling film material, Alessandro Griffini (director of the ENEA media library) on possible scenarios for exploitation of the audiovisual heritage with reference to developments in other countries, and Maria Assunta Pimpinelli of the National Film library on the state of the art with respect to criteria of description for audiovisual materials. With respect to the latter, a report was also delivered on the invaluable contribution of the ANAI working group on cataloguing standards in Italian audiovisual archives, operative as from April 2004 thanks to the stimulus and coordination provided by Isabella Orefice.

The guidelines emerging from discussion during the seminar will be applied by the authors of the overviews in drawing up in-depth final reports on the different subjects for presentation at an international conference to be held by the end of 2006.

It should again be stressed that the results of the seminar stem from the development of the above-mentioned research programme beginning with the 2004 conference (Modelli di archivi audiovisivi), which provided some initial answers to a series of questions.

One of the primary aims underpinning these structured initiatives and pursued by the AAMOD was the increasingly urgent need—as also stressed in the debate during the December seminar—for an overview of the situation as regards the audiovisual material held above all in the small and medium-sized archives located not only in the major cities but also scattered locally throughout all the Italian regions. This would make it possible to develop a hypothesis for a system of Italian audiovisual and audio archives with a strategic role of management and coordination played both by the central institutions and by the local bodies endowed with legal responsibility for protection of the cultural heritage, including the “new” audiovisual and audio sources.

The recent initiative and those already planned for the future—including an international conference on the same issues to be held in the first half of 2006—also pursue the goal of addressing the problems involved in the analysis of possible legislative and organizational models, with reference to experiences at the European and international levels, and standards for the handling of audiovisual materials (conservation, restoration, description, access and use). Attention has also been drawn to the need to identify and share not only models and standards but also an effective working methodology capable primarily of helping the central and local institutions in the planning and allocation of resources for the preservation of material, in creating effective coordination between structures of conservation and institutions, and in developing commonly accepted guidelines and operative solutions in terms of management, information systems, digitization, restoration, services, and promotion of the heritage.

 

Notes

1) The proceedings of the seminar are published in Archivio storico audiovisivo del movimento operaio, Modello d’archivio audiovisivo, Materiali di lavoro e documentazione/1, Rome, 1981. A list of initiatives (conferences, seminars, exhibitions, publications and surveys) undertaken by the AAMOD on these themes is available on the site www.aamod.it.

2) The project was developed by a committee made up of Giuseppe Bertolucci, Letizia Cortini, Giorgio De Vincenti, Ansano Giannarelli, Arturo Mazzarella and Vito Zagarrio.

3) An attempt was made with this initiative and in the sphere of public debate to involve figures with a broad range of professional skills operating in connection with audiovisual archives, albeit in different sectors, so as to promote an open exchange of views on problems regarding the preservation and archival handling of audiovisual materials, the lack of adequate training profiles, the reuse of film and the associated question of rights, the proliferation of new film archives and associated difficulties of legislative regulation, and the application of effective legislative safeguards in the sector.