While telephone and radio have long been used to connect people in real time, television is a special milestone in live broadcast for society. It allowed, "through the participation of our highest and noblest sense organ, the eye" (opening address by the German television broadcasting), simultaneous participation in distant events. The first television programme in the world to be regularly broadcast went ‘on air’ in Nazi Germany in 1935. And so began, stated in full pathos, “the time of an incomprehensible miracle … the people were given sight.” Strangely, however, the Nazis didn’t value television highly as a means of propaganda, hence the crafted, often not overly ‘designed’ documentation allows a unique view not only of the early days of the medium, but of nationalist society without the usual exaggerated propaganda. Because in the early days of television there was no way to record shows, the films in this programme were either pre-produced on film for television or were recorded with the so-called intermediate film system. A feature film about television and its inherent, at the time completely new, surveillance possibilities is also part of the programme. For one evening, the Theatersaal at HKW is transformed into a Fernsehstube (television salon) as public presentation venues – the forerunners of public viewing – were called in the Third Reich.

Professor Joseph Hoppe of the German Museum of Technology, an expert on early television, will be present for the discussion.

Sendezeichen und An- und Absagen des Deutschen Fernseh-Rundfunks (excerpt), 1935, 3 min
Olympia, 1936, 7 min
Fernseh-Grossbildstellen, 1937, 5 min
Werkfilm der Fernsehtechnik, 1939, 9 min
Vorbereitung Reichsparteitag (excerpt), 1936, 9 min
Wer fuhr IIA 2992?, Karl G'schrey, 1939, 15 min
Berlin nach einem Bombenangriff, 1940, 7 min
Bauernarmut in Sowjetparadies, 1941, 5 min
Kalenderblätter "August 1943" (excerpt), 1943, 14 min

Wie baue ich meinen Ofen selbst?, 1943, 8 min

This screening will be in German language only.