Frances Thorpe (1942-2022)
It is with great sadness that we have learned of the passing of former P.I.P. Editor Frances Thorpe at the age of 79. Frances started her career at the British National Film Catalogue in the late 1960s and worked at the Slade Film History Register when she became involved in FIAF’s Periodicals Indexing Project.
Before her appointment as P.I.P. Editor in 1975, Frances was already active in the short-lived FIAF Commission on Cataloguing and Documentation, later the FIAF Documentation Commission. During her editorship (from May 1975 to December 1980), she kept the P.I.P. afloat under sometimes difficult circumstances. Fortunately, she could rely on the support of the BFI’s National Film Archive, which was supervising the P.I.P. administratively on behalf of FIAF. At the end of 1980 Frances Thorpe was offered a position as Deputy Head of the BFI Documentation Department, but she remained an active member of the FIAF Documentation Commission until 1987. After her retirement she moved to Wales.
An interview with Frances Thorpe (based on e-mail exchanges between her and current P.I.P. Editor Rutger Penne) will be included in the forthcoming P.I.P. 50th anniversary book, which will be published in September 2022.
Frances Thorpe at the 1977 FIAF Summer School.
