Friends of the German Cinematheque (German: ) is a Berlin-based, non-profit film society founded in 1963 to promote public access to world cinema and film history. The organisation opened the repertory cinema ''Arsenal'' in 1970, launched the International Forum of New Cinema at the

Berlin International Film Festival The Berlin International Film Festival (), usually called the Berlinale (), is an annual film festival held in Berlin, Germany. Founded in 1951 and originally run in June, the festival has been held every February since 1978 and is one of Europ ...

the following year, and has been operating publicly as Arsenal – Institut für Film und Videokunst e.V. since 2008.

Foundation

Film historian Gero Gandert and the film critics Ulrich Gregor and Erika Gregor registered Friends of the German Cinematheque on 30 March 1963, seeking to make the newly established

Deutsche Kinemathek Die Deutsche Kinemathek – Museum für Film und Fernsehen Berlin (English: "German Cinematheque – Museum of Film and Television Berlin") is a major German film archive and film museum located in Berlin, Germany. Located at Potsdamer Platz sinc ...

’s collections and other rarely shown works accessible to the public. Before acquiring its own venue, the association programmed monthly screenings at the

Akademie der Künste The Academy of Arts () is a state arts institution in Berlin, Germany. The task of the Academy is to promote art, as well as to advise and support the states of Germany. The academy's predecessor organization was founded in 1696 by Elector F ...

, premiering independent titles such as Adolfas Mekas’s ''Hallelujah the Hills'' for German audiences in 1964. Using private loans and donations, the group purchased the disused Bayreuther Lichtspiele in Berlin-Schöneberg and reopened it on 3 January 1970 as the Arsenal, Germany’s first non-profit archive cinema. The cinema relocated to the Filmhaus on

Potsdamer Platz Potsdamer Platz (, ''Potsdam Square'') is a public square and traffic intersection in the center of Berlin, Germany, lying about south of the Brandenburg Gate and the Reichstag building, Reichstag (Bundestag, German Parliament Building), and ...

in 2000, and on 1 November 2008 the association formally adopted the name Arsenal – Institut für Film und Videokunst e.V. to reflect its expanded archival and educational remit.

Activities

Arsenal now organises more than 600 screenings annually and administers a collection of about 9,000 film prints that is being digitised under the long-term “arsenal kollektion” project.

References

{{reflist Film societies Non-profit organisations based in Berlin Organizations established in 1963