The only reason anyone would bend to pick something up from among sidewalk trash is if it is of great value. An abandoned treasure is treasure nevertheless, and that’s the idea multimedia journalist Ahmed Hamed, 28, had when he came across a 35mm film negative discarded on the sidewalk among some garbage. “Every single picture has great value,” said Hamed. “But can you imagine the amount of priceless history, information and art that Egypt loses between the film rolls that are either discarded in the garbage or set ablaze?” While the idea may sound bizarre to some people, to Hamed it was not only the logical, but the right thing to do, to take the abandoned film into care, to clean it carefully and to try dispatching what the film negative narrates. As a video and multimedia journalist, it is natural that Hamed is interested in documentation. This is the reason that drove him to learn about preserving visual art and history from the veterans of the field. “As the world shifted from film photography to digital photography, many studios across Egypt shut down, leaving behind massive archives of film negatives,”…
35mm Film Saved From Garbage Uncovers Rare Footage From Across Egypt
May 11, 2015
