David Woodley Packard Receives the 2025 FIAF Award
At its November 2024 meeting, the FIAF Executive Committee assessed the nominations for the 2025 FIAF Award received from members of the FIAF community and selected David Woodley Packard, President of the Packard Humanities Institute and a well-known philanthropist.
Mr. Packard’s nomination was put forward by our colleague May Hong HaDuong, Director of the UCLA Film & Television Archive. Her supporting statement emphasized his unparalleled contribution to the moving image archive community in the United States over more than four decades. She reminded the FIAF Executive Committee that, working primarily through the Packard Humanities Institute, Mr. Packard has dedicated a considerable portion of his life to improving archival conditions for public and non-profit repositories, preserving hundreds of at-risk titles, showcasing legacy films at thousands of public screenings, preserving and expanding access to newsreels, and more. May Hong HaDuong had no difficulty convincing the Executive Committee that his enduring support for and active efforts towards the preservation and promotion of our shared film culture would make him a profoundly deserving FIAF Award recipient.
The Award was presented to Mr. Packard by May Hong HaDuong and FIAF President Peter Bagrov on 9 June at the Stanford Theatre in Palo Alto, California, on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of this unique movie house presenting classic Hollywood films. It was bought and restored to its orginal splendour in 1987 by the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, and today is owned and operated by the non-profit Stanford Theatre Foundation. The event was also attended by special guest Kimberly Pucci, granddaughter of Reginald Denny, who attended the opening of the Stanford Theatre exactly one hundred years prior.
About the FIAF Award
Since 2001, when the inaugural FIAF Award was presented to Martin Scorsese for his groundbreaking advocacy for the cause of film preservation, FIAF has bestowed its annual award to celebrate a well-known individual external to the archival world whose experience and personal commitment to cinema underlines FIAF’s missions. Past recipients include some of the greatest figures of world cinema: Manoel de Oliveira (2002), Ingmar Bergman (2003), Geraldine Chaplin (2004), Mike Leigh (2005), Hou Hsiao-hsien (2006), Peter Bogdanovich (2007), Nelson Pereira dos Santos (2008), Rithy Panh (2009), Liv Ullmann (2010), Kyoko Kagawa (2011), Agnès Varda (2013), Jan Švankmajer (2014), Yervant Gianikian and Angela Ricci Lucchi (2015), Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne (2016), Christopher Nolan (2017), Apichatpong Weerasethakul (2018), Jean-Luc Godard (2019), Walter Salles (2020), Amitabh Bachchan (2021), Tilda Swinton (2022), Guillermo del Toro (2023), and Wim Wenders (2024).
The FIAF Award trophy, a silver film reel made in Mexico with the assistance of Filmmteca de la UNAM. Photo: Filmoteca de la UNAM.
David Woodley Packard and FIAF President Peter Bagrov at the Stanford Theatre in Palo Alto, California, on 9 June 2025. Photo: Stanford Theatre / Packard Humanities Institute.
May Hong HaDuong, David Woodley Packard and Peter Bagrov at the Stanford Theatre in Palo Alto, California, on 9 June 2025. Photo: Stanford Theatre / Packard Humanities Institute.
