Lady in the dark : Iris Barry and the art of film / Robert Sitton.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Sitton, Robert, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Barry, Iris, 1895-1969.

Barry, Iris.

Museum of Modern Art (New York, N.Y.). Film Library--Biography.

Museum of Modern Art (New York, N.Y.).

Archivists--United States--Biography.

Archivists.

Film critics--England--Biography.

Film critics.

Motion picture film--Preservation--United States--History.

Motion picture film.

Motion picture film collections--United States--Archival resources.

Motion picture film collections.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (870 p.)

Place of Publication:

New York : Columbia University Press, 2014.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Iris Barry (1895-1969) was a pivotal modern figure and one of the first intellectuals to treat film as an art form, appreciating its far-reaching, transformative power. Although she had the bearing of an aristocrat, she was the self-educated daughter of a brass founder and a palm-reader from the Isle of Man. An aspiring poet, Barry attracted the attention of Ezra Pound and joined a demimonde of Bloomsbury figures, including Ford Maddox Ford, T. S. Eliot, Arthur Waley, Edith Sitwell, and William Butler Yeats. She fell in love with Pound's eccentric fellow Vorticist, Wyndham Lewis, and had two children by him. In London, Barry pursued a career as a novelist, biographer, and critic of motion pictures. In America, she joined the modernist Askew Salon, where she met Alfred Barr, director of the new Museum of Modern Art. There she founded the museum's film department and became its first curator, assuring film's critical legitimacy. She convinced powerful Hollywood figures to submit their work for exhibition, creating a new respect for film and prompting the founding of the International Federation of Film Archives. Barry continued to augment MoMA's film library until World War II, when she joined the Office of Strategic Services to develop pro-American films with Orson Welles, Walt Disney, John Huston, and Frank Capra. Yet despite her patriotic efforts, Barry's "foreignness" and association with such filmmakers as Luis Buñuel made her the target of an anticommunist witch hunt. She eventually left for France and died in obscurity. Drawing on letters, memorabilia, and other documentary sources, Robert Sitton reconstructs Barry's phenomenal life and work while recasting the political involvement of artistic institutions in the twentieth century.

Contents:

Front matter

CONTENTS

List of Illustrations

To IRIS BARRY (1895-1969) / Cooke, Alistair

Credits

Previews

1. EARLY YEARS

2. "WE ENJOYED THE WAR"

3. "DEAR MISS BARRY"

4. THE OTHER BLOOMSBURY

5. LIFE WITH LEWIS

6. CHILDREN

7. ALAN PORTER

8. The Spectator

9. SPLASHING INTO FILM SOCIETY

10. CINEMA PARAGONS, HOLLYWOOD, And LADY MARY

11 .Let's Go to the Pictures

12. Victory and Defeat

13. America

14. The Askew Salon

15. Museum Men

16. Remarriage

17. Settling In

18. Cracking Hollywood

19. Art High and Low

20. On to Europe

21. Going Public

22. The Slow Martyrdom of Alfred Barr

23. Meanwhile, Back at the Library

24. New Work, Old Acquaintances

25. "The Master" and His Minions

26. Temora Farm

27. The Museum Enlists

28. Mr. Rockefeller's Office

29. L'Affair Buñuel

30. The Other Library

31. Divorce

32. Postwar Blues

33. Abbott's Fall

34. Hospital

35. Departure

36. La Bonne Font

37. Things Past

38. The Austin House

39. Readjustments

40. New York And London

41. Final Breaks

42. The End

Sequel

Notes

Sources

Index

Notes:

Includes index.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

9780231537148

023153714X

OCLC:

979573934