The National Gallery of Art's summer preservation festival is saluting the French National Film Archives with a series of Ciné-Concerts!

This rare film program at the NGA will include a unique silent French farce and boulevard comedy, a mystery film, and early "wonders of science" shorts -- tinted and toned as they were when they were originally released!

Since 1969, the French National Film Archive / CNC (Archives Françaises du Film/Centre National du Cinéma et de l'image animée) have been collecting and conserving the incomparable cinématic heritage of France. It is estimated that 80 percent of these films produced during the early 1900's have disappeared. Each year, approximately 2,000 new titles are added to the film archive collection facilities in Bois d'Arcy and Saint-Cyr.

WHAT: From Vault to Screen: New Preservations from France

Curator Eric Le Roy and film conservator Caroline Patte

WHEN: Saturday, July 9 at 2:30 PM

WHERE: National Gallery of Art - 4th and Constitution Ave., NW - East Building Concourse, Auditorium

ADMISSION: Free

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Presented with the generous support of TV5MONDE

SATURDAY, JULY 9 AT 2:30 PM

Ciné-Concert: Poetry in Motion—The Scientific Short

East Building Concourse, Auditorium

Andrew Simpson, piano

Conservator Caroline Patte in person

The poetry to be found in fleeting "science" footage has been a constant since the early days of cinema. These 15 delicate tinted shorts, made for the series Scientia by the production house Éclair between 1910 and 1920, are much more than odd curiosities—they are elegant precursors of the nature film, surveying the dusky domains of insects, snails, caterpillars, man-eating plants, and sea critters. L'Ecrevisse (Crawfish, 1912), Le Scorpion Languedocien(1912), Les Orchidees (The Orchids, 1913), La Puce (The Flea, 1914), Le Chrysantheme (The Chrysanthemum, 1914), Les Plantes Carnivores (The Carnivorous Plants, 1914), Les Libellules (The Dragonflies, 1917), and more. (Silent with live piano, total running time approximately 70 minutes)