Austrian Film Museum

The Austrian Film Museum (Österreichisches Filmmuseum) is a film archive, cinematheque, and museum located in Vienna, Austria. Founded in 1964 by independent filmmaker Peter Kubelka and film enthusiast Peter Konlechner as a non-profit organization, it has established itself as one of the most significant institutions for film preservation and presentation in Europe and the world. The museum operates under the legal form of an association (Verein) and functions as a center for the collection, preservation, research, and public presentation of international film history, housing approximately 31,000 films dating from 1893 to the present.

The Austrian Film Museum was founded in February 1964, following a meeting between Kubelka and Konlechner in 1962 at the Internationale Kurzfilmwoche (International Short Film Week), which Konlechner had organized through his student film club Cinestudio at the Technical University of Vienna. The founders aimed to establish a center for the presentation and preservation of international film history, affirming film's dual role as the most important form of artistic expression in modernity and as the chief historiographical source of the 20th century. The institution received financial support from the Austrian government and the City of Vienna, supplemented by private sponsors, membership fees, and admission charges.

In June 1964, the museum was admitted as a provisional member of the International Federation of Film Archives (FIAF), gaining full membership in 1965. After changing venues during its first 18 months, including events such as the Petit Festival Georges Méliès near St. Stephen's Cathedral and a Sergei Eisenstein retrospective at the Graphische Sammlung Albertina, the Film Museum found its permanent home in 1965 in the Albertina building in Vienna's first district. From January 1968, when the museum took over administration of the cinema hall, Konlechner and Kubelka were able to realize their goal of near-daily screenings.

The museum's programming quickly gained recognition. Der Spiegel described it in 1967 as one of the most agile cinematheques in Europe, and film scholar Enno Patalas praised its programs as a positive counter-model to conventional cinema offerings. In February 1974, a 24-hour anniversary program celebrated ten years of operation, reflecting thematic focuses including international avant-garde film, Soviet revolutionary film, film comedy from the 1910s to 1930s, film as historical document, film propaganda, classic American genres, and German-language film exile.

Konlechner and Kubelka served as co-directors until the end of 2001. Alexander Horwath succeeded them on January 1, 2002, expanding programming, screenings, collection and restoration activities, and strengthening education, research, and publications. In 2005, the Austrian government awarded the museum the Honorary Prize at its annual Austrian Museum Awards, with the jury emphasizing its rank among best institutions in its field worldwide. For its 50th anniversary in 2014, the museum realized 21 projects reflecting on its history, collections, founders, and future questions of historiography; that same year, all programs shown since 1964 were made available online through the program archive.

In November 2016, the Board appointed Michael Loebenstein, former Chief Executive of Australia's National Film and Sound Archive, as director from October 1, 2017. In December 2024, the museum moved its depot and digital labs to the new Filmmuseum LAB in the Arsenal, abandoning its previous facility on Heiligenstädter Straße. The new Filmmuseum was presented to the public on September 24, 2025.

The Austrian Film Museum's collection encompasses approximately 31,000 films spanning from 1893 to the present day. The institution's activities are oriented toward the fundamental museum tasks of collection and preservation, research and education, and exhibition. Corresponding to its medium, the museum's exhibitions take place on the cinema screen rather than in conventional gallery spaces. Works from film history and other forms of moving image are presented in their original medium and original language.

The museum maintains a public specialized library and holds photo, poster, and written document collections, as well as numerous special collections devoted to individual filmmakers including Dziga Vertov and Michael Haneke. Its programming includes approximately 700 cinema screenings per year. Key programming series include Was ist Film (since 1996), Die Utopie Film (2005-2017), and Collection on Screen (since 2021), which function as a revolving permanent exhibition presenting essential examples of cinema.

The museum's thematic emphases have historically included international avant-garde film, Soviet revolutionary film, film comedy of the 1910s-1930s, film as historical document, propaganda, classic American genres, and German-language film exile. Since 1966, the museum has organized retrospectives as part of the Viennale film festival, which have held a special position in the German-speaking countries and received European recognition.

The museum's holdings include extensive special collections dedicated to major filmmakers, with particular strength in avant-garde and international cinema. The poster collection features over 100 designs created by Austrian painter and graphic artist Gertie Fröhlich from 1964 to 1984, who also devised the museum's trademark logo: the mythical creature Zyphius, drawn from Renaissance illustrations of mythical animals.

The Invisible Cinema represents one of the museum's most distinctive contributions to film exhibition culture. The concept emerged in conversations around 1958 between Peter Kubelka and architects Johannes Spalt and Friedrich Kurrent, before the museum's founding. Kubelka envisioned a cinema as a machine serving as relay between director and audience, with architectural space completely focused on the image and sound of the film. He first realized this concept at the opening of Anthology Film Archives in New York in 1970. For the Austrian Film Museum's 25th anniversary in 1989, the Invisible Cinema opened according to Kubelka's concept: a black-in-black screening room designed as a seeing and hearing machine striving for maximum concentration on the cinematic event. In October 2003, Friedrich Mascher and Erich Steinmayr realized Invisible Cinema 3 at the same location, significantly renovated and expanded with new seating and improved image and sound reproduction capabilities.

The museum has hosted numerous distinguished filmmakers throughout its history, reflecting the breadth of its collection and programming. Visitors have included Martin Scorsese, Chantal Akerman, John Alton, Olivier Assayas, James Benning, Busby Berkeley, Bernardo Bertolucci, Stan Brakhage, Luigi Comencini, Luc and Jean-Pierre Dardenne, Catherine Deneuve, Claire Denis, Lav Diaz, Jean Eustache, VALIE EXPORT, Harun Farocki, Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Federico Fellini, Michael Haneke, Werner Herzog, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Danièle Huillet, Chuck Jones, Elia Kazan, Alexander Kluge, Kurt Kren, Fritz Lang, Claude Lanzmann, Richard Leacock, Sergio Leone, Richard Linklater, Dušan Makavejev, Gregory J. Markopoulos, Groucho Marx, Jonas Mekas, Jeanne Moreau, Marcel Ophüls, Arthur Penn, Christian Petzold, Yvonne Rainer, Eric Rohmer, Jean Rouch, Paul Schrader, Werner Schroeter, Ulrich Seidl, Don Siegel, Michael Snow, Alberto Sordi, Jean-Marie Straub, Tsai Ming-liang, Agnès Varda, Paul Verhoeven, Luchino Visconti, Viva, Kôji Wakamatsu, Apichatpong Weerasethakul, and Frederick Wiseman.

The Austrian Film Museum is located in the building complex of the Albertina, near the Vienna Hofburg in the city's first district. This location has served as the permanent home for film presentations and offices since 1965, following the museum's initial period of changing venues. The cinema hall itself is situated within the Albertina building and has been the primary exhibition space for the museum's programming.

The Invisible Cinema, the museum's signature screening facility, occupies space within this same Albertina location. The original 1989 installation was renovated and expanded in 2003 as Invisible Cinema 3, with updated seating and enhanced image and sound reproduction technology.

In December 2024, the museum expanded its physical infrastructure with the opening of Filmmuseum LAB in the Arsenal, a new facility for its depot and digital laboratories. This move from the previous Heiligenstädter Straße location represented a significant modernization of the museum's technical and preservation capabilities. The public presentation of the new Filmmuseum facility followed on September 24, 2025.

The Austrian Film Museum operates as a non-profit association (Verein) in Vienna, Austria. Its activities are financed in roughly equal thirds by the Republic of Austria, the City of Vienna, and its own earnings. The museum maintains its website at www.filmmuseum.at.

The institution presents approximately 700 cinema screenings annually, with works shown in their original medium and language. Its public specialized library and collections are accessible to researchers and the public. The museum's programming archive, containing all programs shown since 1964, has been available online since 2014.

Martin Scorsese has served as Honorary President of the Austrian Film Museum since 2005; he is also a vocal supporter of film preservation and visited the museum in 1995 on the occasion of a complete retrospective of his work. In summer 2021, artist VALIE EXPORT was named the first Honorary Member by the museum's Board of Directors.

The museum continues under the directorship of Michael Loebenstein, who assumed leadership in October 2017 following Alexander Horwath's 16-year tenure. The current leadership maintains the founders' fundamental orientation while operating from the established Albertina location and the new Filmmuseum LAB facility.