HISTORY
It all started at The Crumbling Wall. The 1960s was a time of great excitement and experimentation in the arts. Traditional media such as painting and sculpture were used in unconventional ways, and things that had not been considered art at all — like commercial illustration, film, or even noise — were suddenly co-opted into the artistic endeavor by people like Andy Warhol, Robert Rauschenberg, John Cage, Stan Brakhage and many others. New York and San Francisco were the centers of this experimentation, but the excitement soon spread.
“The Crumbling Wall” was a non-denominational coffeehouse run by the Lutheran Church on Forbes Avenue, across from the Carnegie. The proximity of these two places is interesting, because both were to play a part in the development of Pittsburgh Filmmakers. A variety of programs were presented at The Crumbling Wall, including experimental films programmed by Chuck Glassmeyer. A group of interested people developed around these screenings, and soon they wanted more, including making their own films.
This incipient "scene" intensified in 1970, when Leon Arkus and Sally Dixon started the Section (later Department) of Film and Video at the Carnegie. Dixon started bringing artists into town to screen their work. It soon seemed like a natural development that if the artists were here, they should be able to work on their films. She acquired a grant to purchase 16mm filmmaking equipment to this end.
The group found a space in the basement of the now-defunct Selma Burke Arts Center in East Liberty. The general shape of Pittsburgh Filmmakers as it exists today was already taking form then. The building included darkrooms and filmmaking facilities. Workshops in the use of equipment, as well as screenings, were offered. The early presence of photography is attributable to the fact that one of the energizing forces in our development was photographer Robert Haller, later an executive director of Pittsburgh Filmmakers, and now administrative director at Anthology Film Archives in New York City. Photography has always been integral to our activities.
In 1971, a more formal organization was formed. Articles of incorporation were filed and the name Pittsburgh Filmmakers was adopted. Bob Costa was our first director and Robert Gaylor, a successful designer, the first president of our board of directors. Space, and a lack of it, became an issue. The University of Pittsburgh offered us space during 1974. In an empty building at 205 Oakland Avenue, a screening room and spaces for classrooms and darkrooms were made after a lot of sweat. Its location in the heart of the university district was ideal. Pittsburgh Filmmakers began to slowly grow.
The middle years
Do you know part of the story? Write to rengel@pghfilmmakers.org
By 1992, Pittsburgh Filmmakers was operating four buildings — the equipment facility at 205 Oakland, a classroom and editing facility at 218 Oakland, administrative offices around the corner at 3712 Forbes, and the Theater Annex in the historic Fulton Building at 101 Sixth Street downtown. The staff had grown by this time from one to 18 full-time, 8 part-time, and varying numbers of work-study workers. Our current executive director, Charlie Humphrey, began his tenure that year.
Humphrey and his right hand, director of administration Dorinda Hughes, mounted a successful campaign starting in 1993 to modernize and unify our facilities. By the summer of 1995, Pittsburgh Filmmakers was ensconced in our current home at 477 Melwood Avenue, a 44,000-square-foot space formerly used as Carnegie-Mellon University's Tartan Labs. Renovations included the building's first floor — to house equipment, classrooms, darkrooms, and offices — and the 130-seat Melwood Screening Room. The purchase of 477 Melwood Ave was finalized in 1997.
In 1995, the owners of the Fulton Theater Annex asked us to move out; we found a temporary home for the Theater Annex's exhibition program at Point Park College's facility on Craft Avenue in Oakland. Before year's end, it moved into the Harris Theater, a former adult movie house, at 809 Liberty Avenue Downtown. In early 1998, Pittsburgh Filmmakers purchased the Regent Square Theater, at 1035 South Braddock.
Over the years, many different people have worked hard and given much. When you become a member or supporter of Pittsburgh Filmmakers, you join the sum total of all the effort, all the people and all the art that has been made and shown here since 1971. It is up to you to help keep alive the dream that started at "The Crumbling Wall."
Do you know part of the story? Write to rengel@pghfilmmakers.org