Elena Past, chair of the Department of French and Italian, gives a lecture titled "Analog Ecologies for the Digital Age."
Over the past several decades, artists, critics, and scholars have declared (and sometimes mourned) the “death of cinema” as digital filmmaking and projection eclipsed analog. Yet in 2026, analog film is having a twenty-first-century moment. As a scholar of Italian cinema and the Environmental Humanities, Past takes this as an invitation to press on questions of medium, materialities and ecologies. Her research traces the environmental impacts of the film industry, currently through the lens of FILM Ferrania, Italy’s historic film manufacturer. This talk looks back to uncover histories of Italian analog film production, and looks forward to propose some conceptual and perceptual tools analog film offers environmental thinking in the digital age: obsolescence, sensitivity, finitude and solarity.
Inaugural lectures celebrate Arts and Humanities faculty who have been promoted to the rank of professor. All lectures are held in the Faculty Club Grand Lounge from 4-6 p.m. and are preceded by a reception and followed by Q&A and discussion. All lectures are free and open to the public.
The Arts and Humanities Inaugural Lecture Series is sponsored by the College of Arts and Sciences
