Videofreex Archive at the Video Data Bank

As part of the Video Data Bank's ongoing mission to ensure that important video art history is preserved for future generations, we are proud to house the Videofreex Archive.

Founded in 1969, the Videofreex were one of the first American video collectives, producing tapes, installations and media events with the newly available video tools. Active for over a decade, this pioneering group amassed an archive of over 1,500 tapes chronicling the counter-culture movements of the 1960s and 1970s, often broadcasting them via their own pirate TV station. In 2001, Video Data Bank took on the collective's archive, amassing the tapes from a variety of locations across the country, cataloging them, and beginning the work of assessing their condition. The Videofreex Archive consists of 1,500 videotapes on a variety of obsolete formats, including 1/2” open reel, 1” open reel, and 3/4” U-matic. The tapes require cleaning and special handling before they can be viewed and re-mastered to current formats, including digital. 

Currently Available Videofreex Titles

The Video Data Bank currently offers more than seventy preserved titles by the Videofreex, as listed on the collective's artist page. For those who are interested in learning more about the work of this historic collective, VDB offers a 70-minute compilation program: Tuned In, Turned On: Videofreex Tape the World, highlighting excerpts of some of the group's most important works.

Ongoing Preservation of Videofreex Tapes

In order to prioritize titles for preservation, we liaise with Videofreex members to identify the tapes that have particular historical and cultural significance, and research multiple information sources, including the written notes on the original tape boxes, and other texts. Tape preservation is an expensive process, and significant funds will be necessary in order for us to migrate the entire Videofreex Archive to viable formats; while fundraising efforts are currently underway, Video Data Bank is committed to preserving a number of titles each year.

If you are interested in helping to save a specific tape that has not yet been preserved, you can support our efforts to migrate the Videofreex Archive by sponsoring its preservation.

The cost of preserving a single tape is usually $400. As a result of the process, a donor receives a DVD of the title, once preserved, for personal and/or educational use, and the preserved master copy is made available to the world through Video Data Bank’s distribution activities. (Additional rights for footage use can be negotiated on request.) It should be noted that the results of the preservation process are not guaranteed; it is possible that the tape may have been damaged during its lifespan, or have degraded due to past storage conditions. However, most results to date have been positive.

The following is a list of all titles in the Videofreex Archive taken from the labels on the original tapes. To find out more about any of these titles, or to sponsor tape preservation, please send an email to info@vdb.org and mention the specific titles that interest you.

VDB would like to acknowledge the contribution of supporters who have already sponsored the restoration of Videofreex tapes, including documentarian Dylan Nolfi, WETA Televison, members of the band NRBQ, Rose Art Museum, and Pentimenti Productions.