Eye Amsterdam

von Wim Goedhart

EYE Film Institute Netherlands is a Dutch archive and museum in Amsterdam that preserves and presents both Dutch and foreign films screened in the Netherlands. The museum collection includes 37,000 film titles, 60,000 posters, 700,000 photographs and 20,000 books. The earliest materials date from the start of the film industry in the Netherlands in 1895.


EYE is located in the Overhoeks neighborhood of Amsterdam. It includes a cinematography museum formerly called Filmmuseum, founded in 1952. Its predecessor was the Dutch Historical Film Archive, founded in 1946. The Filmmuseum was situated in the Vondelparkpaviljoen since 1975, but in 2009, plans were announced for a new home on the north bank of Amsterdam's waterfront. It was officially opened on April 4, 2012 by Queen Beatrix. The EYE building was designed by Delugan Meissl architects, which specializes in buildings that appear to be in motion, e.g., the Porsche Museum in Stuttgart.