The Deutsche Kinemathek‘s new location has opened, along with its first exhibition, Inventing Queer Cinema, which tells the stories of, about and behind queer cinema. The exhibition highlights films and the people who have shaped this part of cinema since the 1970s. At the center of queer film history (and queer film stories) are individuals who resist normative expectations. Queer cinema has developed its own independent and resistant visual language, pushing back against norms. What challenges came with this? What concerns, what successes? Drawing on key films from recent decades, and especially on the people who shaped them, the Kinemathek has created a dense exhibition that shows what queer cinema means for society, but also for Berlin, as a place of queer subculture with an international community. A new feature at the new location is the “Treasure Chamber”, where items from the collection of the Salzgeber film distributor are exhibited. Every Thursday, admission to the Kinemathek is free and accompanied by a public program of events.
In the small on-site studio cinema, the film program changes weekly. This weekend (16.05.2026), it features queer history by Rosa von Praunheim: It Is Not the Homosexual Who Is Perverse, But the Society in Which He Lives (1971). In June, Paris Was a Woman (1996) follows for all Gertrude Stein fans, later the pastel-gay dreamscape of Pink Narcissus (1971), and then Renaissance camp overload Caravaggio (1986) — to name a few. It’s an exhibition that explores how queer film history and Berlin’s urban history are intertwined. And it’s a good reason to go to the cinema again.
Text: Inga Krumme / Photos: Jonas Walter, Presse Salzgeber, Veruschka von Lehndorff
Deutsche Kinemathek, Mauerstr.79, 10117 Berlin–Mitte; map
Inventing Queer Cinema until 13.09.2026. Find the full program here.
@deutschekinemathek
