Jerusalem Cinematheque

Jerusalem Cinematheque
Gilabrand · CC BY-SA 3.0 · source
Name	Jerusalem Cinematheque
Established	1973
Location	Jerusalem, Israel
Type	Film archive, cinema

Jerusalem Cinematheque is a major film archive and screening institution located in Jerusalem, Israel. It functions as a hub for film preservation, exhibition, and scholarship, hosting retrospectives, festivals, and educational programs that engage international and Israeli filmmakers, critics, and audiences. The institution collaborates with museums, universities, cultural centers, and archives to present programming spanning silent cinema, auteur studies, documentary, experimental film, and world cinema.

History

The founding and development of the institution intersect with figures and organizations such as Menahem Golan, Yoram Globus, Amos Gitai, Eliezer Ben-Yehuda (son), Yitzhak Rabin, Menachem Begin, Golda Meir, Abba Eban and institutions like the Israel Film Archive, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem Film Festival, and Tel Aviv Museum of Art. Early curators drew on collections associated with Moshe Sharett era donors and collaborated with international partners including the British Film Institute, Cinémathèque Française, Deutsche Kinemathek, Library of Congress, and Museum of Modern Art to acquire prints, negatives, and documentation. The Cinematheque’s programmatic evolution paralleled the careers of filmmakers such as Roman Polanski, Ingmar Bergman, Ousmane Sembène, Andrei Tarkovsky, Akira Kurosawa, Federico Fellini, Jean-Luc Godard, Alfred Hitchcock, and Charlie Chaplin, whose retrospectives shaped local cinephilia. Political and cultural shifts involving figures like Shimon Peres, Yitzhak Shamir, Ariel Sharon, and events like the Six-Day War and Oslo Accords influenced funding, audience composition, and international collaboration. Partnerships with festivals and institutions such as the Cannes Film Festival, Berlin International Film Festival, Venice Film Festival, Sundance Film Festival, Venice Biennale, and the Toronto International Film Festival expanded the Cinematheque’s scope. Donors and trustees over time included philanthropists associated with Rockefeller Foundation, Ford Foundation, and families linked to the Rothschild family, which supported expansion and archive conservation projects.

Facilities and Architecture

The Cinematheque occupies a complex near cultural sites like the Israel Museum, the Bloomfield Science Museum, and the Monument to the Negev Brigade, designed with input from architects connected to projects such as the National Library of Israel and the Jerusalem Theater. Facilities comprise screening rooms, restoration laboratories, conservation vaults, a research library, and exhibition galleries modeled on standards used by the International Federation of Film Archives, UNESCO, Getty Conservation Institute, and the American Film Institute. The building incorporates climate-controlled storage influenced by designs from the British Library and the National Film and Sound Archive and features public amenities comparable to the Palais de Tokyo and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago. Programming spaces have hosted collaborations with media centers such as MIT Media Lab, Goldsmiths, University of London, Columbia University School of the Arts, and University of Southern California School of Cinematic Arts, enabling symposia and screenings that required state-of-the-art projection and digital restoration suites influenced by standards at Thomson Viper FilmStream workflows and archival practices from Eastman Kodak research.

Programming and Festivals

The Cinematheque curates year-round series and major events linked to festivals and organizations including the Jerusalem Film Festival, Docaviv, Visions du Réel, IDFA, CICAE, European Film Academy, and the Israel Film Festival. Program themes have ranged from auteur retrospectives on Yasujiro Ozu, Satyajit Ray, Wong Kar-wai, Pedro Almodóvar, and Hayao Miyazaki to focuses on movements like Italian Neorealism, French New Wave, Japanese New Wave, German Expressionism, and Soviet Montage. The Cinematheque presents premieres, restorations, and tributes involving filmmakers such as Werner Herzog, Ken Loach, Spike Lee, Agnès Varda, Claire Denis, and Christopher Nolan, and stages panels with critics and scholars associated with outlets like Sight & Sound, Cahiers du Cinéma, Film Comment, and Variety. Its festival calendar incorporates documentary showcases in dialogue with institutions like Hot Docs, experimental programs with Whitney Biennial affiliates, and youth-oriented series in partnership with cultural ministries and NGOs that have worked with UNICEF-affiliated education initiatives.

Collections and Archives

The Cinematheque’s holdings include film prints, negatives, videotapes, digital masters, posters, production stills, scripts, and personal papers related to directors, producers, and actors such as Chantal Akerman, Ettore Scola, Youssef Chahine, Aki Kaurismäki, Michelangelo Antonioni, Buster Keaton, Marlene Dietrich, Max Ophüls, and Pina Bausch. Archival collaborations and transfers have occurred with the Israel Film Archive, Central Zionist Archives, Yad Vashem', National Archives of Israel, Knesset Archives, and international partners including the Deutsche Kinemathek and Cinémathèque Royale de Belgique. Conservation projects employed techniques and standards from the International Council on Archives, Image Permanence Institute, and the International Association of Sound and Audiovisual Archives to stabilize nitrate and acetate materials and migrate workflows to digital preservation platforms akin to those used by the British Film Institute and the Library of Congress Packard Campus. The archive supports scholarly research, issuing catalogs and curatorial dossiers that reference collections at institutions like the Vatican Film Library, Princeton University, Yale University Beinecke Library, and University of California, Los Angeles Film & Television Archive.

Education and Community Outreach

Educational initiatives engage students and educators from institutions including the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design, Shenkar College of Engineering, Design and Art, Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance, Rabin Medical Center media programs, and international exchange with New York University Tisch School of the Arts, London Film School, La Fémis, and FAMU. Community outreach programs collaborate with municipal bodies such as the Jerusalem Municipality, cultural NGOs, youth organizations like Habonim Dror, immigrant associations including groups from Ethiopian Jews in Israel communities, and veteran support programs that have partnered with the Israel Defense Forces rehabilitation initiatives. Workshops and masterclasses feature filmmakers and scholars like Nadine Labaki, Asghar Farhadi, Isabelle Huppert, Paul Schrader, and curators from institutions such as the Getty Research Institute and the Smithsonian Institution. Activities include film literacy curricula, subtitling and archiving training, restoration internships, and outreach screenings in collaboration with theaters and cultural centers across Jerusalem neighborhoods and regional partners like the Mishkenot Sha’ananim cultural center.

Category:Film archives Category:Cinemas in Israel Category:Culture in Jerusalem