Collezionare e conservare il nostro futuro

The essay explores collecting as a key practice for film memory, from its pioneering origins to the challenges of digital dematerialization. Through the case of the Museo Nazionale del Cinema, the author highlights how collections – from posters and film prints to props, costumes, software, and virtual assets – have redefined the notion of film heritage. In a time when the boundary between material and immaterial is increasingly blurred, the museum emerges as a laboratory of contemporaneity: not only preserving but also critically and creatively interpreting cinema, safeguarding its cultural identity while guiding its future trajectories.