Pärnu exhibition marks 130 years of cinema

ERR reports that an exhibition tracing 130 years of cinema in Pärnu opened at Pärnu Museum on October 30. Curated by Indrek Aija, “Pärnu cinemas: Of time and out of time” explores the city’s cinema history through moving and still images, from its earliest screenings to the present.

The first “living pictures” were shown in Pärnu during the summer fair of 1896. A kinetoscope, described as a one-person cinema, was set up in merchant Maksimov’s house on Rüütli Street. The machine, invented by Edison, was already outdated by the time it was invented, the article says, as cinema’s future lay with the large screen.

The first large-screen screening in Riga took place on May 28, 1896. Pärnu’s first followed in February 1897, in a large hall on Akademia Street belonging to the Pärnu Citizens’ Club, which a travelling cinema operator had rented. Estonia’s first building constructed solely to show films opened in Pärnu in the summer of 1907, opposite the spa establishment. Riga-based travelling exhibitor Karl Stephan showed films there at the Electro-Biograph cinema.

The exhibition also covers cinema buildings that were built or planned but never constructed. It will remain open at Pärnu Museum until January 31, 2027.