Film and Cinema in Styria

The History Museum’s main exhibition in 2022 undertakes forays into the world of Styrian film and cinema history. The range spans from the first film screenings at the end of the 19th century up to contemporary cinematic works by Styrian directors. Aspects of regional and local film production and reception are examined, including the period of the travelling cinema and the founding of the first cinemas, the creation of films in Styria from the 1910s onwards, film and cinema in times of political control, the ‘golden years’ of cinema in the post-war period, and the film city ‘Thaliwood’.

Themes of the exhibition cover the filmic heritage of the Styrian ciné film amateurs, the production of Eumig film projectors in Fürstenfeld, Styrian underground film-making, as well as the work of film auteurs in or from Styria, and the great commercial successes of Styrian film-makers.

The focus is always on the filmic images as well as the stories of people and places, whose importance is shown, against the background of a history about time and the media, in the intermediary spaces and in the relations to one another. Photographs, posters and archival material, but screenplays and film sketches, too, equipment for cinema and (amateur) film technology, and historical cinema inventory show visitors both the familiar and unfamiliar, making (once again) visible what has been forgotten, offering space for individual curiosity, and making it possible to engage with more than 125 years of Styrian cultural history.