Gregory Lukow, chief of the National Audio-Visual Conservation Center, retired July 31. He tells us about his career and future plans.
Tell us about your background.
Born and raised on a farm in Nebraska, I studied broadcast journalism and English as an undergraduate at the University of Nebraska. My college jobs included photochemical processing of 16 mm news film I and my fellow students shot in the J school. I also disc jockeyed for the university radio station and the then most-powerful FM station in Nebraska, KFMQ. My English degree was achieved primarily by taking all the film courses that department offered.
Knowing farm life wasn’t for me, I moved to Los Angeles in 1975 and applied for grad school at UCLA. Happily, I was accepted. I obtained graduate degrees in film and television studies. My first experience with archival film programming was a founder of the student-run UCLA Cinematheque in 1979 showcasing prints from the UCLA Film & Television Archive.
In 1984, I began working at the American Film Institute’s National Center for Film and Video Preservation. I was there 14 years, the last five as director. I’m proud to have been a principal founder of the Association of Moving Image Archivists, in 1991, and to have served five terms as the association’s first elected secretary.
What brought you to the Library?
In 1998, the American Film Institute abolished the NCFVP, and for the next two years I worked at the UCLA Film & Television Archive. My primary responsibility there was to establish UCLA’s Moving Image Archive Studies program — the first such graduate degree offered in the U.S.
In 2000, I was hired as assistant chief in the Library’s Motion Picture, Broadcasting and Recorded Sound Division by division Chief David Francis. My first days on the job, in January 2001, were spent in Dayton, Ohio, where I stopped on my cross-country drive from Los Angeles to D.C. to meet the Film Lab and Nitrate Vault staff at the Library’s Motion Picture Conservation Center.
Francis retired in February 2001, and I served as de facto head of MBRS under acting Chief Diane Kresh, the director of Collections Services, just as the design of what was to become the Packard Campus was getting underway. In 2003, the Library conducted its search for a new chief, and I was immensely gratified to be selected.
What achievements are you most proud of?
Certainly, my first seven years when I was the Library’s lead representative in overseeing the design and construction of the Packard Campus, guiding one of the Library’s most advanced technological undertakings to its opening in 2007.
It was an extraordinary privilege to create a new national audiovisual archive and library as close as possible to the ideal while working with the architects and design engineers that David Packard’s Packard Humanities Institute (PHI) brought to the table and with individuals at the Architect of the Capitol and the Library, including the NAVCC staff. That yearslong effort was by far the most educational, challenging and fulfilling experience of my professional life.
What are some standout moments?
The July 2007 ceremony conveying the completed Packard Campus from PHI to the Library — with numerous members of Congress present — was the capstone moment of those first seven years. Also, the opportunity in 2014 to testify before the House Judiciary Committee on NAVCC’s work and copyright issues important to audiovisual preservation and access.
The live concerts we presented at Packard were immensely enjoyable: We hosted members of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame (Roger McGuinn of the Byrds), the Country Music Hall of Fame (Connie Smith, accompanied by husband Marty Stuart) and the Songwriters Hall of Fame (Jimmy Webb).
Finally, last year’s inaugural Library of Congress Festival of Film & Sound was a fantastic opportunity to showcase the Library’s audiovisual preservation work, and the four-day festival marked the peak movie-going experience of my 24 years at the Library.
What’s next for you?
My wife, Rachel, and I won’t be leaving Culpeper soon. We’ve got a lot of downsizing to do, including preparing a range of collection materials I hope to donate to the Library.
My main retirement project will be organizing my photograph collection. In 1988, I started photographing old and surviving movie palaces and theaters around the world. In doing so, I began “collecting” U.S. highways and back roads, and I look forward to taking many more road trips with Rachel and adding more theaters to the collection. Thus far, I’ve photographed over 3,800 theaters. Over half of them were shot on 35 mm film between 1988 and 2003, so one of my main retirement projects will be to digitize those negatives.
Subscribe to the blog— it’s free!