A 20th anniversary celebration of cult Australian film The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert will mark the National Film and Sound Archive’s (NFSA) first exploration into online exhibitions.
The Priscilla: 20 Years Young exhibition displays a variety of text, video, 3D photos and documents providing insights and previously unknown facts about the 1994 classic in what represents the first move towards producing more cost effective programs for the audio-visual archive organisation.
Fabulous frocks and behind the scenes videos aren’t the only things featured in the exhibition- a number of little known facts have been put together to bring the making of the Stephan Elliot film to life, including original concepts featuring Kylie Minogue as the movie’s soundtrack headliner over disco stars ABBA.
“So many of these artefacts are quite delicate and quite detailed and so we had to have a lot of conservation work and we had to have conversations with our preservation team in what can go on display, how can we digitise these things,” curator Tenille Hands told the ABC.
“We were able to do that with 3D capture of the costumes, by scanning all of our documentation, scanning our stills, press kits, all that type of material.”
Cuts in government funding have forced the NFSA to diversify “or perish”. Early response to the new exhibit has already attracted thousands of visitors.
“There will be a focus on doing more online so we’ll see how that resonates with audiences and what the take-up is but there are other opportunities for doing other, similarly curated exhibitions,” NFSA CEO Michael Loebenstein said.
“It doesn’t offer you the kind of experience that you would get in a proper museum gallery, it is different.
“We can’t pretend that online is exactly the same but just more portable and easier than a real material cultural exhibition, but in terms of reach of an exhibition like that it is fantastic.
“You don’t have to put a show on the road, you don’t have audiences in other parts of Australia having to wait for months or even for years to be able to get a glimpse into our vault.”
Check out the full exhibition at the National Film and Sound Archive’s official website.
