Cinema 16
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Cinema name : Cinema 16
Building name : The Central High School for Needle Trades Address : 225 W 44th Street Neighborhood : Midtown / Garment District Years of occupancy : 1947 - 1963 Screens (seats) : 1 (1600) Active individuals : Amos Vogel (owner, programmer), Marcia Vogel (owner), Jack Goelman (programmer) |
Gallery
Art for the masses : The legacy of the Cinema 16 film society
Amos and Marcia began putting together alternative film programs in 1947 first at the Provincetown Playhouse, then growing to the auditorium of the Central HS for Needle Trades. The first program was so successful they repeated it 16 times. Cinema 16 programs consisted of a diverse selection of films that members were unlikely to see anywhere else. This included films imported from foreign countries, unique films made on shoestring budgets, scientific documentaries, and political films too radical to be picked up by other distributers.
Vogel was successful at exposing audiences to a diverse array of filmmaking possibilities while creating programs that appealed to large audiences, even while at times pushing the limits of taste. Marcia Vogel, in particular, fielded comments from audience-members who had been offended. The programs created an opportunity for people to dialogue about what moved them, what didn’t, what should be art, what is important to be exposed to.
It is remarkable that his programs of such diverse and experimental films gained such popularity. At its height in the 50s membership was over 7000. Audiences routinely packed the 1,600 seat Needle Trades auditorium twice a night and were re-screened at neighborhood repertory theaters.
The murals were finished in 1940 by Ernest Fiene. They depict the conditions of sweat shop, home work, and child labor and memorialize the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire. The imagery honors immigrants and the 5 needle trades taught at the school. Enlightenment triumphs over greed through the good works of government, education, and unions.
Macdonald describes Vogel’s legacy Vogel was, above all, an audience builder, a teacher, and a political motivator. For him, the challenge was to use the widest articulation of film practice as a means of invigorating viewers' interest in cinema and their willingness to use what they learned at Cinema 16 in their everyday lives as citizens of the United States and the world.
In 1963, Amos and Marcia Vogel could ignore the financial instability of Cinema 16 no longer. Amos refused to raise membership prices or solicit corporate sponsors so the film society ran in deficit. Amos went on to programming films with the Lincoln Center for the Arts.
Vogel was successful at exposing audiences to a diverse array of filmmaking possibilities while creating programs that appealed to large audiences, even while at times pushing the limits of taste. Marcia Vogel, in particular, fielded comments from audience-members who had been offended. The programs created an opportunity for people to dialogue about what moved them, what didn’t, what should be art, what is important to be exposed to.
It is remarkable that his programs of such diverse and experimental films gained such popularity. At its height in the 50s membership was over 7000. Audiences routinely packed the 1,600 seat Needle Trades auditorium twice a night and were re-screened at neighborhood repertory theaters.
The murals were finished in 1940 by Ernest Fiene. They depict the conditions of sweat shop, home work, and child labor and memorialize the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire. The imagery honors immigrants and the 5 needle trades taught at the school. Enlightenment triumphs over greed through the good works of government, education, and unions.
Macdonald describes Vogel’s legacy Vogel was, above all, an audience builder, a teacher, and a political motivator. For him, the challenge was to use the widest articulation of film practice as a means of invigorating viewers' interest in cinema and their willingness to use what they learned at Cinema 16 in their everyday lives as citizens of the United States and the world.
In 1963, Amos and Marcia Vogel could ignore the financial instability of Cinema 16 no longer. Amos refused to raise membership prices or solicit corporate sponsors so the film society ran in deficit. Amos went on to programming films with the Lincoln Center for the Arts.
Quotes & Notes
Films chosen by Amos Vogel and Jack Goelman. 1947 The signatories on the Certificate of Incorporation were Amos and Marcia Vogel, Robert Delson (a civil liberties lawyer who remained Cinema 16's lawyer for years), David Diener (Marcia Vogel's brother), Rene and Ralph Avery (close friends), and Samuel Vogel (Vogel's father).
Run by Amos and Marcia Vogel between 1947 and 1963, Cinema 16 held screenings at various sites including the Paris Theater, the Hunter College Playhouse, the Fifth Avenue Playhouse, the Provincetown Playhouse, the Beekman Theater, the Murray Hill Theater, the Central Needles Trades Auditorium, and various first-run theaters in Manhattan.
One of the first film societies. At peak (1950s) had 7000 members
1947 - Nonprofit purposes
"(a) To promote, encourage, distribute and sponsor public exhibition of documentary, sociological, educational, scientific and experimental motion pictures, and to further the appreciation of the motion picture as an art and as a social force.
(b) To advance the science and technique of the production and distribution of documentary, sociological, educational, scientific and experimental motion pictures; to further the production of such films by amateurs; and to encourage the production of feature-length film classics.
© To foster interest in and to promote the establishment of motion picture theaters in the principal cities of the United States for the public exhibition of documentary, sociological, educational, scientific and experimental motion pictures."
MacDonald, S. (1997). Cinema 16: Documents Toward a History of the Film Society. Wide Angle, 19(1), 11.
"all the films in both programs can be seen as supplying evidence about what is usually termed individual personal expression. From the very beginning, Vogel was determined to demonstrate that there is an alternative to industry-made cinema, an alternative which is in touch with the practical and spiritual lives of individuals, whether these lives [End Page 14] are represented by committed documentarians or expressed in abstract or psychodramatic imagery. For Vogel, filmgoing was more than a process of experiencing, over and over, the particular codes of genre film, or worshipping the physical beauty or the dramatic ability of the stars; it was a means of getting in touch with the immense and fascinating variety in the way people live and with the myriad ways in which individuals express their inner struggles."
MacDonald, S. (1997). Cinema 16: Documents Toward a History of the Film Society. Wide Angle, 19(1), 13-14.
When Cinema 16 ceased distributing films in 1963, Vogel made an arrangement with Barney Rosset at Grove Press. In keeping with Vogel's previous contractual arrangements, filmmakers were offered exclusive contracts with Grove: if they wanted to distribute their work cooperatively, they would be on their own.
MacDonald, S. (1997). Cinema 16: Documents Toward a History of the Film Society. Wide Angle, 19(1), 30.
Run by Amos and Marcia Vogel between 1947 and 1963, Cinema 16 held screenings at various sites including the Paris Theater, the Hunter College Playhouse, the Fifth Avenue Playhouse, the Provincetown Playhouse, the Beekman Theater, the Murray Hill Theater, the Central Needles Trades Auditorium, and various first-run theaters in Manhattan.
One of the first film societies. At peak (1950s) had 7000 members
1947 - Nonprofit purposes
"(a) To promote, encourage, distribute and sponsor public exhibition of documentary, sociological, educational, scientific and experimental motion pictures, and to further the appreciation of the motion picture as an art and as a social force.
(b) To advance the science and technique of the production and distribution of documentary, sociological, educational, scientific and experimental motion pictures; to further the production of such films by amateurs; and to encourage the production of feature-length film classics.
© To foster interest in and to promote the establishment of motion picture theaters in the principal cities of the United States for the public exhibition of documentary, sociological, educational, scientific and experimental motion pictures."
MacDonald, S. (1997). Cinema 16: Documents Toward a History of the Film Society. Wide Angle, 19(1), 11.
"all the films in both programs can be seen as supplying evidence about what is usually termed individual personal expression. From the very beginning, Vogel was determined to demonstrate that there is an alternative to industry-made cinema, an alternative which is in touch with the practical and spiritual lives of individuals, whether these lives [End Page 14] are represented by committed documentarians or expressed in abstract or psychodramatic imagery. For Vogel, filmgoing was more than a process of experiencing, over and over, the particular codes of genre film, or worshipping the physical beauty or the dramatic ability of the stars; it was a means of getting in touch with the immense and fascinating variety in the way people live and with the myriad ways in which individuals express their inner struggles."
MacDonald, S. (1997). Cinema 16: Documents Toward a History of the Film Society. Wide Angle, 19(1), 13-14.
When Cinema 16 ceased distributing films in 1963, Vogel made an arrangement with Barney Rosset at Grove Press. In keeping with Vogel's previous contractual arrangements, filmmakers were offered exclusive contracts with Grove: if they wanted to distribute their work cooperatively, they would be on their own.
MacDonald, S. (1997). Cinema 16: Documents Toward a History of the Film Society. Wide Angle, 19(1), 30.
