The Royal Belgian Film Archive[1] (French: Cinémathèque Royale de Belgique;[2] Dutch: Koninklijk Belgisch Filmarchief[3]) is a cinematheque located in the Centre for Fine Arts, in Brussels, Belgium. It is often referred to as CINEMATEK (a homophone of cinémathèque).
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| Established | 1938 |
|---|---|
| Location | Centre for Fine Arts, Brussels, BE |
| Coordinates | 50°50′39″N 4°21′37″E / 50.844172°N 4.360152°E |
| Type | cinematheque |
| Founder | Jacques Ledoux, Constantin Brodzki and Corneille Hannoset |
| Website | www |
  Location of Cinematek | |
History
The cinematheque was established in 1938 as a film archive[1] by Henri Storck, André Thirifays, and Piet Vermeylen.
In 2002 the Film Museum founded by Jacques Ledoux, Constantin Brodzki and Corneille Hannoset was integrated into the archive to become a cinematheque.[4]
Collection
Its collection include works on film by Man Ray, Duchamp and Léger.[6] As of 2018, the archive held 47,726 films and over a hundred-thousand film materials, with over eight thousand of the items originating from Belgium.[7] The challenges associated with managing the collection were discussed in a 2001 article[7] by Gabrielle Claes who served as director of the archive from 1988 until 2011.[8][9]
CINEMATEK led the organization of the EXPRMNTL film festival which was run four times: 1949, 1958, 1963, 1967, and 1974.[10][11] The festival is depicted in the 2016 film Exprmntl which was shown in 2019 at the London Short Film Festival.[12][13]
Curators
- Jacques Ledoux, 1948 to 1988[14]
- Gabrielle Claes, 1988 to 2011[15]
- Nicola Mazzanti, 2012 to 2020[8]
- Tomas Leyers 2020 to [16][17]