The Schweizer Filmarchiv, also known as the Cinémathèque suisse, is the Swiss national film archive. Founded in 1943 in Basel, the institution moved to Lausanne in 1948, where it was inaugurated in 1950 under the name Schweizerisches Filmarchiv [1]. Its visual identity has evolved through at least two distinct design eras, from a mid-century mark by a prominent Swiss graphic designer to a contemporary monogram by a London studio.
Design and History
The original Schweizer Filmarchiv symbol was designed by Hermann Eidenbenz in 1950 [2]. Eidenbenz (1902-1993) was a Swiss graphic artist and one of the founders of Swiss graphic design, known for numerous posters, logos, stamps and banknotes, including the Swiss 10- and 20-franc notes [3]. His mark for the archive was a logotype built around a single letter F, composed with circular and rotational elements [4]. Eidenbenz had earlier worked with the archive’s predecessor in Basel, designing the poster for the 1943 opening exhibition “10 Tage des Films in Basel” at the Gewerbemuseum [5].
In 2011, the institution commissioned the Swiss-British design agency Jannuzzi Smith to rethink its visual identity, including the logo, at the request of director Frédéric Maire [6]. The new identity was unveiled in March 2012, coinciding with the start of construction of the archive’s new research and archiving centre in Penthaz [7]. The rebrand was part of a broader restructuring aimed at enabling a fuller and more open presentation of the archive’s resources across print, online and on-site media [8].
Meaning and Symbolism
The 2012 Jannuzzi Smith logotype is built from two semicircles placed facing each other, slightly offset, creating a formal play in which the letters C and S can be recognised, referencing the institution’s French name Cinémathèque suisse [9]. The mark was presented in red and black versions [9].
Typography and Design
For the 2012 identity, Jannuzzi Smith chose a very simple typography that continues the monogram’s formal language [9]. The earlier Eidenbenz mark, by contrast, was a purely pictorial logotype based on the letter F, using circular and rotational forms rather than a wordmark [4].
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