| INFO | BIOGRAPHY. Abstract of book-length biography of Iris Barry by Robert Sitton, published New York: Columbia University Press, 2014. Title: Lady in the dark; Iris Barry and the art of film. Abstract: "Iris Barry (1895-1969) was a pivotal modern figure and one of the first intellectuals to treat film as an art form, appreciating its far-reaching transformative power. ... she was the self-educated daughter of a brass founder and a palm-reader from the Isle of Man. An aspiring poet, Barry attracted the attention of Ezra Pound and joined a demimonde of Bloomsbury figures including . . .. She fell in love with Pound's eccentric fellow Vorticist, Wyndham Lewis, and had two children by him. In London, Barry pursued a career as a novelist, biographer, and critic of motion pictures. In America .. she met ...director of the new Museum of Modern Art. There she founded the museum's film department and became its first curator . . . She convinced powerful Holywood figures to submit their work for exhibition, creating a new respect for film... [During] World War II, she joined the Office of Strategic Services to develop pro-American films with Orson Welles, Walt Disney, John Huston, and Frank Capra. . . . She eventaully left for France and died in obscurity. . . .." (WorldCat.) |
Iris Barry