The Gosfilmofond State Film Archive

About

The Gosfilmofond is the main film archive of the Russian Federation and a member of the International Federation of Film Archives (FIAF). Its name is an abbreviation of three words: Gosudarstvennyi (meaning "state"), film (meaning "a motion picture film"), and fond ("a fund or foundation").

The archive curates a vast collection of films and other materials, engages in cultural and educational activities, runs research groups, and even has its own festival called “Belye Stolby Festival” ("White Pillars Festival"), which takes place every year in the last week of January. The main focus of the festival is to show films from the Russian state collection.

In 1997, the Gosfilmofond was listed in the Guinness World Records as one of the three largest film archives in the world. The collection contains more than 70,000 film titles, ranging from the silent films of the Lumière brothers to contemporary Russian and international cinema.

History and Collection

The idea of creating a national film archive was actively discussed by filmmakers in the 1920s. The basis of the Gosfilmofond was a unique collection of silent films rescued by film historian Sergei Komarov and transferred to the State Technical College of Cinematography.

In 1935, the Organizational Bureau (Orgburo) decided to create a film negative fund due to the poor preservation conditions of films and other cinematographic materials in the country at that time. In 1936 it was proposed to the General Directorate of the Cinematographic Industry to build a central vault for negatives in Moscow.

At first it was decided to build the storehouse on the territory of the Mosfilm Studio, but then it was moved to the village of Belye Stolby near Moscow. Construction began in 1937, and the Gosfilmofond was officially opened in 1948.

Since then, in parallel with the progressive development of the film industry of the USSR, the formation of a unique collection of the archive began. Today the permanent collection consists of 1,135,310 film reels and 1,125,335 photographic documents. In 2018, the Gosfilmofond celebrated its 70th anniversary.