Jenny Gilbertson
| Jenny Gilbertson | |
|---|---|
| Born |
Jenny Brown 28 October 1902 Glasgow, Scotland, United Kingdom |
| Died | 8 January 1990 (aged 87) Shetland, Scotland, United Kingdom |
| Occupation | Filmmaker |
Jenny Gilbertson (born Jenny Brown; 28 October 1902 – 8 January 1990) was a Scottish documentary and educational filmmaker.
Jenny Gilbertson was born on 28 October 1902, in Glasgow, Scotland; the only daughter of Mary Dunn Wright, and an iron merchant, William Brown. She studied at Laurel Bank School, then furthered her education at Glasgow University where she earned an MA in teaching. Her relationship with films started after she went to London for a secretarial course in journalism in 1929. She concluded that educational and documentary style filmmaking was for her after she saw an amateur film about the Scottish Loch Lomond in London; which resulted in her purchasing her first 16mm camera.
Gilbertson chose Shetland as her first subject as she had been taken there by her family as a child. Gilbertson met native Shetlander farmer Johnny Gilbertson while filming one of her earlier films, Rugged Island: A Shetland Lyric (1933), where Gilbertson played the lead in the story-documentary film. They married shortly after the completion of the film, in 1934. She experienced a halt in her filmmaking career until the 1960s, due to the birth of her and her husbands two daughters, the distant location of Shetland, and World War II. It was not until after retiring from a teacher position that she entered her second phase of filmmaking.
Following her purchase of a 16mm camera, Gilbertson went to the archipelagos of Shetland in 1931. This is when she made her first film A Crofter's Life in Shetland and invited Scottish documentary maker John Grierson to watch it. Grierson was impressed with her work and supported her by encouraging her to purchase a more advanced camera. She then purchased a 35mm Eyemo, and made five more films in Shetland; all of which Grierson bought for the GPO Film Unit (General Post Office Film Unit). Following which Gilbertson toured Britain and Canada, lecturing on her film The Rugged Island: A Shetland Lyric. She made one film with Evelyn Spice Cherry, Prairie Winter, (1934).
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