Category: Helen Hill Award

Apply for the 2026 Helen Hill Award: deadline Oct. 16

  Filmmakers! Apply for the 2026 Helen Hill Award!  The Orphan Film Symposium invites independent filmmakers to apply now for its 2026 Helen Hill Award.  Conferred by the University of South Carolina Film and Media Studies Program and NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts and its Martin Scorsese Department of Cinema Studies, the award has an application process open to all.  To apply, use this web form.  The recipient/s of the award will be funded to participate in the 15th Orphan Film Symposium, April 8-11, 2026, in Columbus, at The Ohio State University’s Wexner Center for the Arts.   They will

[Read on. . . . ] Apply for the 2026 Helen Hill Award: deadline Oct. 16

Fox Formosa Film

A Preview of the Unveiling of a Parade in Taiwan, 1930 by Siyi Quan (NYU Cinema Studies)  At the 2024 Orphan Film Symposium, Klavier Wang, an assistant professor at National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University in Taiwan, presents new research done with graduate student Yung-Cheng Yen. In her talk “Unveiling the True Face of a Parade” she will screen Fox Movietone News footage filmed on the island of Taiwan in 1930 and discuss the complexities of public life in occupied Formosa.             The University of South Carolina’s Moving Image Research Collections catalog assigns the unedited newsfilm the title Formosan New

[Read on. . . . ] Fox Formosa Film

The Thursday line-up

The roll-out continues!  Here’s the simple-text version of the first full da of the NYU Orphan Film Symposium, Work & Play, April 10 through 13, 2024, at Museum of the Moving Image. We begin Wednesday evening with screenings from Argentina, including the North American premiere of La vida a oscuras (2023), Enrique Bellande‘s profile of film collector Fernando Martin Peña.  Registration is now open to all.  Day two is filled with diverse screenings by 25 presenters: newly-discovered films by Roman Vishniac; Nintendo arcade games with 16mm film loops; a psychedelic game for PlayStation1; Japanese “paper films”;  amateur films from Canada,

[Read on. . . . ] The Thursday line-up

The 2024 Helen Hill Award goes to Jeremy Rourke

Every other year, the Orphan Film Symposium confers its Helen Hill Award to an exceptional independent filmmaker whose work befits the late artist’s legacy, celebrating creativity, collaboration, animation, and things made by hand. This year we recognize media artist/animator/musician/performer Jeremy Rourke.  Preview his work at jeremyrourke.com, his Vimeo page, and Instagram @jeremy.rourke. But his is a live cinema practice.  As part of “Orphans 2024: Work & Play,” Rourke will screen his work and perform original music with the projections at Museum of the Moving Image, April 10-13. The NYU Orphan Film Symposium brings together an international audience of archivists, artists,

[Read on. . . . ] The 2024 Helen Hill Award goes to Jeremy Rourke

Helen Hill Award applications

Update June 2025:  Information about applications for the 2026 Helen Hill Award will post here after July 1, 2025.  Submissions due Oct. 15, 2025.   The 2026 symposium will be at the Wexner for the Arts, The Ohio State University in Columbus, O.  Dates: April 8-11, 2026. The award recipient will attend the symposium in person and collaborate with organizers on the form and content of the presentation of their work. Travel and accommodations paid by NYU Orphans. ————————————– Filmmakers! Apply for the 2024 Helen Hill Award!  The Orphan Film Symposium invites independent filmmakers to apply now for its 2024 Helen

[Read on. . . . ] Helen Hill Award applications

Watch Reanimating Histories 3 (Kelly Gallagher)

Recorded June 16, 2022, in the de Sève Cinema, Concordia University, Tiohtià:ke / Montreal. Part 3 of 3. The culmination of the Reanimating Histories session was the tradition of “Helen Hill night.”   Kelly Gallagher receives the OFS Helen Hill Award and Kodak grant.  Symposium co-founders Susan Courtney (U of South Carolina) and Dan Streible (NYU) introduce. After Kelly’s remarks (“Another world is possible”), watch seven of her works, ranging from an early student film to two of the most recent inspiring productions.  The line-up: A Herstory of Women Filmmakers (2009),  More Dangerous Than a Thousand Rioters: The Revolutionary Life of Lucy

[Read on. . . . ] Watch Reanimating Histories 3 (Kelly Gallagher)

Watch Reanimating Histories 2 (Phil Hoffman)

Since 2008, each NYU symposium recognizes an independent filmmaker with its Helen Hill Award, given to media artists who share the spirit of the late experimental animator’s work and values. On this occasion, awardee Kelly Gallagher agreed we should show a Helen Hill film. We selected one of her films made during her years in Canada, and in particular one she made at the now-legendary “Film Farm” in Ontario.  When we discovered the founder would be in attendance, we of course asked him to speak — which he graciously did.  This was the only celluloid print screened at the symposium. 

[Read on. . . . ] Watch Reanimating Histories 2 (Phil Hoffman)

Watch Reanimating Histories 1 (Bill Morrison)

Recorded June 16, 2022. Here’s the opening segment of the Orphans 2022 program “Reanimating Histories,” which was built around filmmaker Kelly Gallagher receiving the Orphan Film Symposium’s biennial Helen Hill Award.           First, Bill Morrison was to introduce his recent film Buried News. Pairing his work with Helen Hill makes sense. She screened her first home movie footage rescued from the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina at the 2006 Orphan Film Symposium, in her hometown of Columbia, South Carolina. He was there to debut Who By Water. She presented him with her VHS copy of his film Decasia with the muck of

[Read on. . . . ] Watch Reanimating Histories 1 (Bill Morrison)

Stream

Select portions of the 2022 Orphan Film Symposium on Counter-Archives can be watched live on the NYU Cinema Studies Vimeo site.  1. Register your name, affiliation, and email address using the NYU Orphan Film Symposium registration portal. Type in $0 in payment (or a pay-what-you-will donation). If you make no payment, you will not get an automatic email confirmation.  However, we will email a PASSWORD to all registrants on Tuesday, June 14. And again June 15 and 16. Use this password to log-in to the Live Event (as Vimeo calls it). If you previously registered to attend, no need to

[Read on. . . . ] Stream

Our 2022 Helen Hill Award goes to KELLY GALLAGHER

Each biennial Orphan Film Symposium confers the Helen Hill Award to an exceptional independent filmmaker whose work befits the late artist’s legacy, a celebration of creativity, animation, collaboration, and things made by hand. This year that’s Kelly Gallagher. On June 16, at Concordia University in Tiohtià:ke / Montreal, Orphans 2022 hosts Kelly Gallagher at the symposium, where she will screen her work for an international audience of archivists, artists, scholars, and curators. Her films certainly resonate with those of the award’s namesake. And given this year’s symposium theme — Counter-Archives — she is an apt match to the occasion.  We

[Read on. . . . ] Our 2022 Helen Hill Award goes to KELLY GALLAGHER