ARTFEED — Contemporary Art Intelligence

Gosfil'mofond's Belye Stolby Festival Revives Shelved Soviet and International Film Archives

festival-fair · 2026-04-19

From February 1-6, 2010, the 14th Gosfil'mofond Festival was held at the State Film Fund's archive in Belye Stolby, Russia. This festival showcases retired prints from a vast collection exceeding 65,000 titles, with approximately 1,000 films added each year. Artistic director Vladimir Dmitriev emphasized the 'Archival Rarities' segment. Uzbek filmmaker Ali Khamraev referred to the archive as a 'mausoleum of film.' The event featured thematic blocks such as 'The Forbidden Yefim Dzigan' and premiered Dzigan's film 'Vsegda na-cheku' from 1972-73. Notable rediscoveries included Dzhemma Firsova's 1966 short and American film 'The Force of Evil.' Historian Valerii Fomin led a roundtable discussing wartime chronicles. Established in 1948, Gosfil'mofond is state-funded and won a State prize in 2007.

Key facts

  • The 14th Gosfil'mofond Festival ran February 1-6, 2010 in Belye Stolby, Russia.
  • Gosfil'mofond is the State Film Fund, one of the world's largest film archives with over 65,000 titles.
  • The archive holds pre-revolutionary Russian films, Soviet works, and part of the Nazi Reichsfilmarchiv.
  • Uzbek director Ali Khamraev called the archive a 'mausoleum of film,' comparing it to Lenin's mausoleum.
  • The festival premiered Yefim Dzigan's never-released 1972-73 film 'Vsegda na-cheku' (On the Watch).
  • Artistic director Vladimir Dmitriev stressed the growing role of the 'Archival Rarities' section for reconstructions.
  • A 2007 State prize honored archive director Nikolai Borodachev, deputy Vladimir Dmitriev, and specialist Irina Vasina.
  • The archive adds about 1,000 new films annually and is directly funded by the Russian government.

Entities

Artists

  • Natascha Drubek-Meyer
  • Ali Khamraev
  • Nikolai Borodachev
  • Vladimir Dmitriev
  • Irina Vasina
  • Yefim Dzigan
  • Dzhemma Firsova
  • Vasilii Aksënov
  • Abraham Polonsky
  • Frank Borzage
  • Vladimír Opěla
  • Hans-Joachim Schlegel
  • Kadzuo Yamada
  • Natalia Nusinova
  • Sergei Kapterev
  • Valeri Bosenko
  • Olga Tschechowa/Chekhova
  • Mikhail Tchekhov/Chekhov
  • Viacheslav Tikhonov
  • Sergei Solov'ëv
  • Nikolai Maiorov
  • Nikolai Izvolov
  • Grigorii Aleksandrov
  • Esfir' Šub
  • Mikhail Romm
  • Yael Hersonski
  • Ivan Dykhovychnyi
  • Natalia Iakovleva
  • Galina Krasnoborova
  • Igor' Khomskii
  • Il'a Kazankov
  • A. Evsiukov
  • Valerii Fomin
  • Aleksandr Deriabin
  • S. Pustynskaya
  • Maja Turovskaia
  • Wolfgang Beilenhoff
  • Sabine Hänsgen
  • Karin Mundt
  • Christa Blümlinger
  • Jay Leyda

Institutions

  • Gosfil'mofond
  • State Film Fund
  • National Film Archive, Prague
  • VGIK (State Film School)
  • Boehlau Verlag
  • ARTMargins Online
  • University of Regensburg
  • Reichsfilmarchiv
  • Deutsche Wochenschau
  • Echo of Moscow
  • International Moscow Film Festival

Locations

  • Belye Stolby
  • Russia
  • Moscow
  • Domodedovo Airport
  • Sofia
  • Vítkov
  • Prague
  • Czech
  • Germany
  • Japan
  • United States
  • USA
  • Crimea
  • Harbin
  • Mandzhuria
  • Israel
  • London
  • Lithuania
  • Regensburg

Sources