Book launch at Pordenone, 9 October!

The official presentation of our latest book American Cinematographers in the Great War is set! On Thursday evening October 9, 2014, at the Verdi Theatre in Pordenone, Italy, this publication will be presented for the first time.

On behalf of our publisher John Libbey and the Pordenone Film Festival as a sponsor for this book we invite you all to join us and get to know the story on these remarkable American cameramen of World War I. All authors will be there to join you during the book launch!

For more information on the Pordenone Festival of Silent Films, go to http://www.cinetecadelfriuli.org/gcm/

Wilbur Durborough entering Germany, 1915. Colorized picture. 

link to original high res image

"Krieg der Bilder" (Austria, 2014)

Because of the centennial of World War I the Austrian Film Archives has produced Krieg der Bilder, an astonishing DVD Box with some rare footage on the Great War. For more information go to www.filmarchiv.at

DVD Series

The three-part DVD series shows how the Habsburg Monarchy used motion pictures as an increasingly important tool for publicity and wartime propaganda. Part I of the DVD series has an unusual scene, taken from a still photograph found at the Austrian State Archives. The caption says - translated into English - "A cinematographer in the destroyed city of Ivangorod, 1915."

As it turns out, the cinematographer is not an Austrian or even a German but the American film correspondent, Albert K. Dawson, from Vincennes, Indiana.

Albert K. Dawson in Ivangorod, August 1915

Link to high res image

Przemyśl Scenes on European Film Gateway

Albert Dawson in camp before Przemyśl, May 1915. Colorized picture. 

Photograph from the collection of the National Archives, Washington, D.C. 

Extended Version

An extended version of scenes, found before by the authors in the Imperial War Museum, showing segments of Albert K. Dawson's film The Battle and Fall of Przemyśl (1915), has been uploaded on the website of the European Film Gateway/Project 1914.

Albert Dawson at flower market in Berlin, March 1915

These films are from the Austrian Film Archives and have Hungarian subtitles. The aftermath of the conquest of Przemysl by the German-Austrian armies is shown, as well as scenes showing Dawson inspecting the ruined forts and the Russian soldiers who were killed in action while defending Przemysl against Austrian machine gunners.

Check out a video from the Imperial War Museum, showing some of these scenes.