Museum of the Moving Image

Brief Information

The museum grew on the site of a film studio that, in 1970, was already slated for demolition as a long-vacant property. The site was purchased by the Astoria foundation, and the former film production facility became a museum, opened in 1988. That is why this place is interesting not only for its collection, but for its very change of role: here, films were first shot, and later they began to be shown and explained as the history of the moving image.

The source text calls the museum the first in the United States entirely dedicated to the history of cinema. At the same time, its subject is broader than film alone: it includes television, video, and computer games. This range helps one see the museum as a place where the screen is understood not as a single genre, but as a whole chain of technologies and viewing habits.

What to Notice First

The main focus of a visit is to compare the place’s old studio origins with what appeared after its transformation into a museum. The grounds of the former Kaufman Astoria Studios explain why not only the exhibits are especially important here, but also the connection with film production itself: early films by the Marx Brothers and other notable movies were created on this site.

Within this logic, three confirmed details are worth highlighting: the movie theater, the video game collection with equipment, and the result of the 2008–2011 renovation, after which the floor area doubled. The theater presents the museum as a place for showing rare films on the big screen. The games and their technology expand the theme of the moving image beyond the film screening. The expanded space matters not in itself, but as a sign that the museum grew from a preserved section of a former studio into a larger space for different screen forms.