We were taken aback by this beautiful photo by Samer Farha in the DCist Flickr pool this morning. After only a quick glance at the tag “Library of Congress,” I was trying to place this building somewhere in the city, but then realized this is a shot of the gorgeous architecture of the National Audio-Visual Conservation Center, out in Culpeper, Va. Tucked in the Blue Ridge Mountains, both American and international film, television, and audio files are preserved and stored — in the 90 miles worth of shelving — on this campus. Not only do they take care to keep volatile components, like nitrate film, from being damaged, but the Mary Pickford Theater (much more conveniently located in the Library of Congress in D.C.) shows these treasures in free events that are scheduled nearly every day. The screenings, which we regularly include in our About Tonight feature, include everything from Shakespearean classics to the 1970 Kessen! Nankai no daikaiju Gezora Ganime Kameba (Space Amoeba), which totally just went on my Netflix queue. A/V and history geeks will want to check out the rest of Samer’s fascinating photos from his tour through the building. EXIF.
