Lumière: Discovered

The exhibition Lumière: Discovered represents the discovery of eighteen short rolls of 35mm movie film that were produced by the Lumière brothers, who were among the originators of motion pictures. Auguste and Louis Lumière were French inventors who developed the Cinématographe, an all-in-one device featuring a movie camera, film developing processor, contact printer, and projector. This invention enabled the Lumières to emerge at the forefront of the development of cinema as a new artform.

The Lumière films, which often showed brief scenes of everyday life, caused a sensation among the public. While other inventors claimed to be the first to exhibit a movie, the Lumière brothers’ combined inventiveness, business acumen, and showmanship spurred the early growth of the film industry with over 1,400 films produced under the Lumière banner between 1895 and 1905.

It is no small miracle that this rare collection of films was found in excellent condition, and acquired by the museum, in 2017. All of the original nitrate film elements are fully preserved and stored in the George Eastman Museum’s Louis B. Mayer Conservation Center. New audiences now have the opportunity to sample the Lumière company’s filmmaking efforts of 120 years ago made with the fledgling medium. The subjects represent a broad sampling of subject matter ranging from documents of events to an ambitious staging of Victor Hugo’s famous novel Notre-Dame de Paris.

The films in this program were preserved by Samuel B. Lane as part of the Haghefilm Fellowship program held in collaboration with the L. Jeffrey Selznick School of Film Preservation at the Eastman Museum. Thanks to Clara Auclair and Samuel B. Lane for filmographic research and individual film descriptions that follow.

There are seventeen short films ranging from a few seconds to nearly three minutes in length. Total program length is nineteen minutes.

24 me Chasseurs alpins. Saut d’obstacles (Sauts d’obstacles – chasseurs alpins) (24th Chasseurs Alpins Obstacle Jumping Exhibition) (Unknown photographer, France 1897, 48 sec.)

Danse au bivouac (Dance at the Bivouac) (Alexandre Promio, France 1896, 46 sec.)

Fête au village/Fête dans un village suisse (Village Festival/Festival in a Swiss Village) (Alexandre Promio, France 1896, 41 sec.) 

Pompiers: alerte (Firefighters: Alert) (Alexandre Promio, France 1897, 49 sec.) 

Salut dans les vergues (Salute in the Yards) (Alexandre Promio, France 1897, 46 sec.)

[Fête du Palais-Royal #1] ([Royal Palace Festival #1]) (Unknown photographer, France 1899, 1 min.)

[Fête du Palais-Royal #2] ([Royal Palace Festival #2]) (Alexandre Promio, France 1899, 46 sec.)

[Fête du Palais-Royal #3] ([Royal Palace Festival #3]: Re-enactment of scenes from Victor Hugo’s “Notre Dame de Paris”] (Unknown photographer, France 1899, 2 min. 52 sec.)

[Panoramic painting of a battlefield] (Unknown photographer, France ca. 1896-1899, 47 sec.)

[Military parade at the Cour d’Honneur in Versailles] (Unknown photographer, France ca. 1903, 43 sec.)

[Panorama on the Creuse River #1] (Unknown photographer, France ca. 1896-1899, 49 sec.)

[Dam on the Creuse River] (Unknown photographer, France ca. 1896-1899, 50 sec.)

[Panorama on the Creuse River #2] (Unknown photographer, France ca. 1896-1899, 49 sec.)

[Paper manufacture] (Unknown photographer, France ca. 1896-1899, 15 sec.)

[Journalists and typographers in editorial office] (Unknown photographer, France ca. 1896- 1899, 45 sec.)

[Men unloading a train] (Unknown photographer, France ca. 1896-1899, 50 sec.)

[Train pulling into a factory] (Unknown photographer, France ca. 1896-1899, 52 sec.)