Human Flower Project
Lights, Camera, Flowers, Action!
Roll over, Ted Turner—Here comes the Texas Archive for the Moving Image. This amazing endeavor is collecting and preserving all manner of filmed and televised Texana. Already it includes full-length feature films, industrial films, TV programs, ads, and (our favorite) home movies. For those of us interested in vernacular culture, this archive offers vivid evidence of what people in Texas considered significant or beautiful—precious to remember. Just as flowers signal moments of importance, so does film recording. We’re eager to investigate their coincidence through this new viewer-friendly resource.
The still below comes from the Raymond Winter Collection, two girls in a San Antonio garden, c. 1948. For flower lovers, in this same hour-length compilation, there are also superlative bougainvillea spilling down a tile roof and quite a lot of the Battle of the Flowers Parade, the city’s spring festival (many non-floral interludes too, such as a bullfight in Mexico, a visit to the Gulf Coast, and many women with white gloves on….). In other TAMI collections we’ve found footage of a garden club gathering and lots of family celebrations featuring opulent corsages and floral decorations on tables and cakes.
In 2009, the Texas Archive of the Moving Image will hold public film-gathering events in Austin, Lubbock, and a third location in the Southern Rio Grande Valley. Anyone with moving images they’d be willing to add to the collection is encouraged to come forward. We’ll announce those dates as we hear of them, but you can (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) to learn more.
“Every year, home movies, television programs, and locally produced films are lost as these visual records of Texas rapidly decompose or are simply thrown away.” Donors to the non-profit Texas Archive of the Moving Image can be sure that their contributions will be preserved, studied, and enjoyed for generations. As the old Tonight Show would promise “more to come….”
Girls with snapdragons in a San Antonio garden, 1948
Still from the Raymond Winter Collection, Texas Archive of the Moving Image