Announcing Updated Clip and Photo Licensing Section of GME’s Website, Highlighting Our Work with Todd Haynes’ THE VELVET UNDERGROUND Film
/“Haynes appears to have vacuumed up every last photograph and raw scrap of home-movie and archival footage of the band that exists and stitched it all into a coruscating document that feels like a time-machine kaleidoscope. He draws [extensively] on the underground films of the period, which were often dream-play documentaries, and he divides the screen into sections, introducing the principals by playing their words off the flickering black-and-white images of their Warhol screen tests. As a collage of the period, “The Velvet Underground” is dazzling: a hypnotic act of high-wire montage.…”
– Owen Gleiberman, Variety
Opens October 13 at Film Forum and Films at Lincoln Center Premieres October 15 on Apple TV+
GME is proud to announce that we have licensed clips from key underground and experimental films for Todd Haynes’ stylistically cutting-edge documentary about the renowned band The Velvet Underground, premiering in cinemas on October 13 at New York’s Film Forum and Film at Lincoln Center and broadcast on October 15 on Apple TV+.
Director Todd Haynes is no stranger to making unconventional, unforgettable films about rock musicians, from his debut short film Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story which featured Barbie dolls, to his daring exploration of the '70s glam rock scene in Velvet Goldmine, to deploying a cadre of famous people to play Bob Dylan stand-ins in the brilliant I'm Not There. Now, he's finally released his first ever documentary, all about NYC's greatest experimental rock band of the '60s, The Velvet Underground.
The Velvet Underground was an American rock band formed in New York City in 1964. The original band consisted of singer/guitarist Lou Reed, instrumentalist John Cale, guitarist Sterling Morrison, and drummer Angus MacLise, who was replaced by Moe Tucker in 1965. Pop artist Andy Warhol became their manager in 1966, and they became the band for the Factory, and Warhol’s traveling multimedia show, the Exploding Plastic Inevitable from 1966-1967. They released 4 albums (“The Velvet Underground and Nico” (with German singer and model Nico) in 1967, “White Light/White Heat” (1968), “The Velvet Underground” (1969) and “Loaded” (1970).
“Haynes deals with the band on the level they wanted (as musical poets, innovators, and influence) with admiration, but not uncritical reverence. THE VELVET UNDERGROUND is a documentary that meets The Velvet Underground eye-to-eye and enriches it.”
– Fionnuala Halligan, Screen Daily
For this substantial production enriched with avant-garde movies from the era GME provided clips from Jonas Mekas’ Award Presentation to Andy Warhol (1964), Scenes from the Life of Andy Warhol (1963-1990), and Walden: Diaries, Notes, and Sketches (1969), Warren Sonbert’s Amphetamine (1966), Peter Emmanuel Goldman's Echoes of Silence (1964) Gideon Bachmann’s Underground New York (1968). Included among these is the famous clip of the Velvet Underground performing at the 1966 New York Society for Clinical Psychiatry, in Jonas Mekas' WALDEN: DIARIES, NOTES AND SKETCHES (1969).
GME is also now pleased to announce a newly updated section of GME’s website devoted exclusively to clip and photo licensing. GME has provided film excerpts for movies directed by Martin Scorsese, Errol Morris, Todd Haynes, and Ric Burns (among others) for documentaries on Bob Dylan, Timothy Leary, the Velvet Underground, and the history of New York City. These various productions have aired on major broadcasters worldwide, include PBS (American Masters), Apple TV+, Showtime, VH-1, the BBC (Great Britain), WDR (Germany) and Arte (France).
In addition, as exclusive representatives of the Estates of photographers Hugh Bell and Raimondo Borea, GME has licensed photographs from their archives of jazz singers Billie Holiday and Sarah Vaughan; educator and activist Kenneth B. Clarke; and John Houseman of the Actor’s Studio. These and other photographs from these artists’ collections have been licensed for documentary films (Billie, The Blinding of Isaac Woodard); book publications (“Acting in the Academy”); USPS Forever stamps; and permanent museum installations (the New York State Museum), acquisitions (the National Museum of African American History and Culture), and exhibitions (“Art of Jazz” at Harvard University).
GME President Jon Gartenberg has gained a reputation as a go-to source among footage licensors for underground films from the 1960’s to the 1990’s. GME Fine Arts Curator David Deitch has presented GME’s photography collections to the American Society of Picture Professionals (ASPP) and the American Photography Archives Group (APAG), and knows these picture collections in depth.
For further information about licensing film clips or photographs, please write info@gartenbergmedia.com.