- National Media Museum
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Coordinates: 53°47′26″N 1°45′20″W / 53.790556°N 1.755556°W
National Media Museum 
Established 1983 Location Bradford, West Yorkshire, England Visitor figures 613,923 (2009)[1]
Director Colin Philpott Website www.nationalmediamuseum.org.uk National Museum of Science and Industry National Media Museum · National Railway Museum (Shildon Locomotion Museum) · Science Museum (Dana Centre, Science Museum Swindon) The National Media Museum (formerly the National Museum of Photography, Film and Television) is a museum in Bradford, West Yorkshire, England. Part of the National Museum of Science and Industry, it was the 20th most popular museum in the United Kingdom in 2009, with 613,923 visitors.
The first head of the museum was Colin Ford who was succeeded by Amanda Nevill. The current head is Colin Philpott, a former BBC journalist.
Contents
History
The museum is on the site of a former theatre and art gallery in the centre of Bradford and came about as the result of discussions between Dame Margaret Weston and Bradford city. The National Museum of Photography, Film and Television, opened to visitors on the 16 June 1983. The museum launched Britain’s largest cinema screen, IMAX, five storeys high with six-channel sound, on the same day. At the time, it specialised in the art and science of images and image-making. Colin Ford believed that understanding how images are made led to appreciation of the ideas expressed and the intentions and skills of image-makers. To mark the 50th anniversary of the first public television service, two interactive television galleries were developed in 1986. These let visitors operate cameras on a studio set with programmed sound and lighting, use vision mixers, to read a news item from an Autocue and discover how Chromakey works. These exhibits survived until the re-naming of the museum in 2006.
In 1989, to celebrate the 150th anniversary of photography, the museum launched the Kodak Gallery, some of the 10,000 items illustrating popular photography from its invention. This was followed by installation of a standard television studio, first used by TV-am (for outside broadcasts) and later Nickelodeon. These studios were the first live broadcasting studios in a museum. Today, the equipment is used to teach students from the School of Informatics at the University of Bradford, with whom the museum has a partnership for BSc and BA courses in media and television. In 1994, TV Heaven was launched, making accessible the museum's collection of television programmes, most of which not available elsewhere.
While continuing to run Pictureville Cinema and exhibitions in a mill on the other side of the city, the museum closed its main site on 31 August 1997 to allow for a 19-month, £16 million redevelopment making the museum 25 percent bigger. The IMAX cinema was also developed to show 3D films. The new museum was opened on 16 June 1999 by Pierce Brosnan, making the museum one of the most popular in the UK.
On 1 December 2006, the museum was renamed the National Media Museum.
Building and admission
The National Museum of Photography, Film & Television
National Media Museum, Bradford City CentreEntrance is free with the exception of cinema screens and some specialist exhibitions. The museum is open 10 am until 6 pm Tuesdays–Sundays. The museum closes for special tours on Mondays. The museum underwent a £16 million refurbishment in 1998, developing a new digital technology gallery and now hosts the BBC's Bradford offices, and studios for BBC Radio Leeds and the BBC Bradford and West Yorkshire Website. This new development created a new glass-fronted atrium, which houses a new cafe and shop.
There are seven permanent exhibitions:
- Kodak Gallery – Covering photography from the 1840s.
- Experience TV – 200 objects from museum collections, and hands-on displays.
- TV Heaven – An opportunity to select from 1000 television programmes to watch.
- Magic Factory – The science behind television.
- Animation – The history of animation, with a permanent "Animator in Residence" involved in the museum's workshops.
- Profiles Gallery & IMAX Projector Box – the film collection.
- Games Lounge – Retro games from your childhood to play in the foyer area
Current temporary exhibitions: 12 March – 5 September 2010 Free Admission
Simon Roberts: We English
We English is an investigation of the English at leisure. Between August 2007 and September 2008, Simon Roberts travelled the length and breadth of England, documenting people at play, relaxing and revelling.[2]
Robbie Cooper: Immersion
People are immersed in screen media for longer periods and with more intensity than ever before. From children watching television to people living out second lives through online virtual worlds, Robbie Cooper’s imagery captures the many ways in which people choose to disengage from everyday life.[3]
The museum contains:
- The Pictureville Cinema containing 306 seats
- The Cubby Broccoli Cinema (in memory of Cubby Broccoli, producer of James Bond films) containing 108 seats
- The IMAX cinema
The museum is host to courses taught with the University of Bradford's EIMC Department including BSc Media Technology & Production, BSc Creative Media & Technologies, BSc Computer Animation and Special Effects and BA Media Studies. Subjects include broadcast television using the TV studio on its top floor. The EIMC degree show is in the Pictureville Cinema.
Collection
The museum's collection contains three million items of historical, cultural and social value, including the first photographic negative, the earliest television footage, the world's first moving pictures (Louis Le Prince's 1888 films of Roundhay Garden Scene and Leeds Bridge). It also contains original toys from the BBC series Playschool – the first programme on BBC2. The collections are accessible to the public through its Insight study centre. The collection of the Royal Photographic Society was transferred to the Museum on behalf of the nation in 2003.[4]
The museum incorporates the first permanent UK installation of an IMAX cinema[5] (with a second screen opening in the UK 15 years later). Opened in 1983 as part of the Bradford Film Festival with the projector visible from a darkened booth of the 4th floor, this screen runs IMAX presentations seven days a week, including IMAX prints of Apollo 13, The Lion King, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire and Batman Begins. In 1999, IMAX upgraded the system and began releasing IMAX 3D presentations.[6] In June 2010 it was announced that the Ray and Diana Harryhausen Foundation had agreed to deposit the animator's complete collection of some 20,000 pieces with the National Media Museum.[7]
The museum also incorporates the Pictureville Cinema – opened in 1992 and described by David Puttnam as 'the best cinema in Britain', Pictureville Cinema screens everything from 70mm to video; from Hollywood to Bollywood; from silents to digital sound, with certifications in presentation including THX in sound and picture and the Dolby EX system. This cinema is one of only three public cinemas in the world permanently equipped to display original 3-strip 35mm Cinerama prints.[8] In 2008, the cinema presented the only true recorded public screening of Danny Boyle's 2002 film Alien Love Triangle.
The museum hosts Bradford Film Festival in March, Bite the Mango in September and Bradford Animation Festival in November. These attract international speakers and new and classic works from around the world.
References
- ^ "Visits made in 2009 to visitor attractions in membership with Alva". Association of Leading Visitor Attractions. http://www.alva.org.uk/visitor_statistics/. Retrieved 21 May 2010.
- ^ [1][dead link]
- ^ [2][dead link]
- ^ "Record grant creates world-class photography archive - Home News, UK". The Independent. 2002-06-10. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/record-grant-creates-worldclass-photography-archive-644914.html. Retrieved 2011-10-24.
- ^ Museum Future and History[dead link] (ASP). National Media Museum. Bradford, England. Retrieved on 17 December 2009. "First IMAX Cinema in Britain: 1983 the Museum launched one of its biggest attractions: Britain’s largest cinema screen, IMAX."
- ^ "Movie heaven right here in Bradford – Telegraph & Argus, 26 June 2009". Thetelegraphandargus.co.uk. http://www.thetelegraphandargus.co.uk/news/news_cityoffilm/news_cityoffilm_features/4461622.Movie_heaven_right_here_in_Bradford/. Retrieved 2011-10-24.
- ^ "Harryhausen donating life's work to Bradford museum". BBC News Online (BBC). 29 June 2010. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10443618. Retrieved 17 May 2011.
- ^ Green, Mark (2009-07-30). "National Media Museum blog". Nationalmediamuseum.blogspot.com. http://nationalmediamuseum.blogspot.com/2009/07/documentary-filming-at-museum.html. Retrieved 2011-10-24.
External links
- National Media Museum
- National Museum of Science and Industry
- The official National Media Museum print website containing many images from the museum's photographic collections
- Courses taught in partnership with the University of Bradford
- National Media Museum Blog
- National Media Museum on youtube
Categories:- Photography museums and galleries
- Museums sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport
- IMAX venues
- History of film
- History of television
- National museums of the United Kingdom
- Photography in Britain
- Museums in Bradford
- Museums established in 1983
- Cinema museums in the United Kingdom
- Cartooning museums
- Media museums in the United Kingdom
- 1983 establishments in the United Kingdom
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