Origins Cinema Collection

At the beginning of the twentieth century, the city of Barcelona was a major hub for film distribution, with branches and representatives of all the main production companies, especially French and Italian ones.  This is almost certainly the origin of most of the copies recovered and preserved in our film archive, which includes titles by Lumière, Pathé, Gaumont, and Star-Film, as well as films by Spanish pioneers such as Eduardo Jimeno.

This collection consists of more than 400 titles produced between 1896 to 1909, which has grown thanks to donations from different collections. It is a collection of immense historical value for studying the origins of cinema worldwide and the gestation of the new cinematic language. Many of these titles have not yet been restored and therefore cannot be consulted. However, since 2005, new digital technologies have made it possible to launch a specific restoration project for this material, which will gradually be made available to all users.