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Title edit
Irish Film Institute
Description edit
The National Film Institute of Ireland was officially incorporated on June 2nd 1945, so this year marks the 60th anniversary of the organisation that developed into the present IFI. Its origins go back to a 1936 papal Encyclical, Vigilanti Cura, and the desire expressed by Pope Pius XI that the medium of cinema be put to the services of human morality.
Guided by these principles, the founders of the Institute, under the patronage of Dr Charles McQuaid, Archbishop of Dublin, established an organisation that would spend the next three decades producing, distributing and exhibiting educational films in both the Irish and English languages to schools and other groups. Its eclectic output included the production in 1945 of A Nation Once Again, marking the centenary of the death of Thomas Davis, and the filming of GAA finals from 1948 onwards.
By the 1980s, the moral impetus behind the establishment of the Institute had faded and television had taken over many of its activities. 1982 heralded a new approach to the functions and ambitions of the Institute, which now received active support from the Arts Council. With Arts Council and lottery funding, this phase of development culminated in the purchase in 1987 of the old Quaker Meeting House premises at 6 Eustace Street, which was named the Irish Film Centre.
