The Cinema Comes to Belarus
Auguste and Louis Lumière are credited with developing one of the first widely-used motion picture cameras, the Cinématographe, which they demonstrated in Paris in March 1895.1 At that time, the land that would become today’s Republic of Belarus was considered the North-Western Region of the Russian Empire.2
It was not long after that March 1895 demonstration that the moving pictures made their way to Russia, then to Belarusian territory. It would be another 30 years before Belarusians began to make their own feature films, but that does not mean that there is not a rich history of experience with the cinema.
Soviet film historian Semeon Ginzburg writes that in May 1896, a Lumière representative, Frenchman Camille Cerf, came to St. Petersburg, Russia, Cerf was there to film the coronation of Nicholas II, a film now known as Scenes from Coronation of the Czar.3 There are also claims that it was not Cerf, but Charles Moisson and Francis Doublier who shot the film.4
Video of Scenes from Coronation of the Czar, 1896.
Coronation of Nicholas II and Alexandra Feodorovna, the solemn procession in the Kremlin, 1896.
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coronation_of_Nicholas_II_and_Alexandra_Feodorovna
Russian film historian Boris Likachev says that the first film showing in Russia was when the Lumière representatives were in St. Petersburg. It may be the most famous short subject ever made: L'arrivée d'un train en gare de La Ciotat.5
Video of the famous film L'arrivée d'un train en gare de La Ciotat.
Poster of the film L'arrivée d'un train en gare de La Ciotat, 1896.
Source:https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0000012/
Representatives of the Lumière brothers brought the Cinématographe to the industrial fair at Nizhny Novgorod later in 1895 to demonstrate it to the rest of Russia. Soviet film historian Nikolai Lebedev writes that the demonstrations were at Charles Aumont’s “Theater-concert Parisienne.”6 Film historians Yuri Tsivian and Alan Bodger write that visitors got a taste of so much that is still associated with the film industry.
Yuri Tsivian and Alan Bodger
Records are scarce but probably all over the Russian empire, just like almost everywhere around the world, businessmen and hustlers began to look to the cinematograph to make their fortunes. According to American film historian Jay Leyda there were lots of people looking to make their fortunes as traveling showmen.
Jay Leyda
The Lumière brothers, end of the XIX century.
Source: https://www.history.com/news/the-lumiere-brothers-pioneers-of-cinema
In January of 1898, a certain Mr. Katin arrived in Vitebsk, near today’s north eastern border of Belarus and Russia. When Katin arrived, he faced a problem. He was ready to show moving pictures but he had no place to show them.
Katin’s search for a place to show his films led him to, of all places, the Vitebsk Theological Seminary. Katin need the permission of Bishop Alexander because the films were “of a frivolous nature.” Katin then placed a small advertisement in the Vitebsk Provincial Gazette. Katin himself probably wondered just how many people would come to his show, which he called “The Last Cinema Screenings.”9
Vitebsk Theological Seminary, end of the XIX century.
Source: http://evitebsk.com/wiki/Витебская_духовная_семинария
On February 5, 189810 about a week after the screenings at the Seminary, the Gazette published another article. It said the audience was treated for about a minute at a time to films with such provocative titles as Female Feud, Bathing, Spanish Dance, Bathing of Negroes, and Gambling.11 One wonders what led the local bishop saw the names of the films before approving them to be shown.
Katin continued to organize film shows, either in gymnasiums or in the hall of the yacht club. At a military meeting, unsurprisingly, the officers liked the films French Artillery on Parade and Steeplechase.12
Since those showings, Katin has disappeared into history.
Lumière Cinématographe.
Source: NPGallery, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
Louis Poyet demonstrating the use of a Cinématographe.
Source: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
1 “Le Cinèmatrographe Lumière” [“The Lumière Cinèmatograph”], Institut Lumière [Lumière Institute] https://www.institut-lumiere.org/le-cinematographe-lumiere Accessed 7 Dec. 2025.
2 Zaprudnik, Jan. Historical Dictionary of Belarus. The Scarecrow Press, 1998, p. 12.
3 Гинзбург, С. [Ginzburg, S.). Кинематография дореволюционной России (Kinematografiya dorevolyutsionnoy Rossii) [Cinematography of Pre-Revolutionary Russia]. Art Publishing House, 1963, p. 25.
4 “Charles Moisson” Who’s Who of Victorian Cinema. https://www.victorian-cinema.net/moisson Accessed 07 Dec. 2025; “Francis Doublier” Who’s Who of Victorian Cinema. https://www.victorian-cinema.net/moisson Accessed 7 Dec. 2025.
5 Лихачев, Борис С. [Likachev, Boris S.]. Кино в России (1896–1926) (Kino v Rossii (1896–1926)) [Cinema in Russia, 1896–1926]. Academia, 1927, p. 24.
6 Лебедев, Николай [Lebedev, Nikolai]. Очерк истории кино СССР — Немое кино (Ocherk istorii kino SSSR — Nemoye kino) [Essays on the History of Film in the USSR: 1918–1934]. Art Publishing House, 1965, p. 3.
7 Yuri Tsivian and Alan Bodger, “Early Russian Cinema and Its Public,” Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television, vol. 11, no. 2, 1991, pp. 105–120. Taylor & Francis Online, https://doi.org/10.1080/01439689100260131
8 Leyda, Jay. Kino: A History of the Russian and Soviet Film. George Allen and Unwin, 1960, p. 24.
9 Кирик, Сергей [Kirik, Sergey]. «Во время первых показов люди в панике выбегали из зала. С чего начиналось кино в Беларуси» [“During the First Screenings, People Ran Out of the Hall in Panic: How Cinema Began in Belarus”]. 1prof.by, 24 Sept. 2021, www.1prof.by/news/vo-vremya-pervykh-pokazov-lyudi-v-panike-vybegali-iz-zala-s-chego-nachinalos-kino-v-belarusi/ Accessed 31 Jul. 2025.
10 Ibid.
11 Ibid.
12 Ibid.