The collections at VSW showcase the aesthetics, cultural history, and social uses of still and moving images. Holdings encompass both creative work and vernacular objects, as well as items that represent the history of media use.

Please consider a tax-deductible donation to help us preserve and exhibit our important collections.



  • Nathan Lyons Research Center

    Hours
    Monday–Friday: 10am–4:30pm;
    By appointment.

    For more information

    Please contact  jessicajohnston@vsw.org or taranelson@vsw.org

  • Watch Portable Channel Videos

    Portable Channel was a Rochester, NY non-profit (1971–1987) founded by documentary filmmaker and activist Bonnie Sherr Klein.

  • Explore Moving Image Collections

    Search selections from the moving image collections.

  • Listen to the VSW Audio Collection

    Listen to selected audio recordings from the VSW audio collection.

  • Search Books and Periodicals

    Search the books in the Nathan Lyons Research Center Library

  • Community Conversion Lab

    The Community Conversion Lab is VSW’s on-site digitization lab for converting magnetic tapes and film media for access and preservation.

  • Search Photography Collections

    Search selected photographs from the Visual Studies Workshop photography collection.

  • Search The Joan Lyons Independent Press Archive

    Search artist’s books in the Independent Press Archive

  • Lantern Slide Collection

    The VSW Lantern Slide Archive houses a collection of over 60,000 nineteenth and early twentieth century glass lantern slides and related equipment.

  • Primary Resources

    Documents and correspondence related to photographic artists and historians from the mid 1960s through the 1980s.

  • Joseph Selle Fox Movie Flash Collection

    The Fox Movie Flash collection, photographed by Joseph N. Selle and his crew of street photographers, consists of approximately one million images of people on the streets of San Francisco from the 1940s to the 1960s.

  • Soibelman Syndicate News Agency Archive

    The Soibelman Syndicate News Agency Archive is an extensive and diverse collection of more than 40,000 news agency photographs from the interwar period.