Northwest Film Center (Portland, OR)
20 May 2010
The Northwest Film Center is a regional media arts resource and service organization founded to encourage the study, appreciation, and utilization of the moving image arts, foster their artistic and professional excellence, and to help create a climate in which they may flourish. The Center provides a variety of film and video exhibition, education, and information programs primarily directed to the residents of Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana, and Alaska.
How did your organization start?
The Northwest Film Study Center was founded in 1971 (founding directors Bob Summers and Denise “Brooke” Jacobson) and was one of many regional media arts centers that came out of national thinking and investment in how independent media makers could find audiences, increased access to production and distribution resources, and identity apart from, and in the context of, the commercial film/entertainment industry. As part of building/recognizing an indigenous media arts culture, exhibiting diverse work, teaching, and providing broad context for understanding the historical and cultural issues related to the moving image arts became central to the Center's mission and programs. The Center's initial board was made up of local educators, filmmakers, film historians, and arts citizens sharing in interest in film as art and as an instrument/medium of social engagement and change.
What is special about your organization?
The diversity of the Center’s programs and services and their connectedness to the community. Over four decades the NWFC has woven together a unique array of exhibition, education, and artist service programs that bring many audiences together in a context that provides broad perspective on the media arts locally, regionally, and internationally. From the Northwest Film & Video Festival, our annual survey of new work by regional makers (now 37), to the Portland International Film Festival (now 34) and year-round program of visiting artists, thematic series, retrospectives, and special events—to the NWFC School of Film (38 years) and statewide artist residency program (32), Oregon Media Arts Fellowship, fiscal sponsorships, equipment access and more, the Center strives to be at the center.
What is your organization currently working on that excites you?
Cultivating long-term artist in residence programs and developing our national-model Service Learning Center, a collaboration with Portland Public Schools, Portland State University, NEA, Mt. Hood Cable Regulatory Commission, and other service organizations throughout the metro area. We are also working on a searchable (web) regional artist database that will bring together information on the thousands of films showcased and/or entered in the Northwest Film & Video Festival over 36 years—a remarkable body of independent work not as accessible as it ought to be.
What is the future of your organization? What are you striving for?
The Film Center's future lies in collaboration: connecting artists, audience, organizations, and supporters to build a vibrant community with many voices.
What else do you want the media arts community to know about your organization?
We are always looking for interesting work to show, visiting artists, talented faculty, interns, and volunteers . Please check out the Northwest Film Center website, find us on Facebook, or follow us on Twitter (@nwfilmcenter).
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Location
1219 S.W. Park, Portland, OR
United States
45° 30' 58.7376" N, 122° 40' 59.1708" W
