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IMMA and IAMF hold joint meeting to celebrate Museomontagna's 150th anniversary

15.05.2024

In honour of the 150th anniversary of the Museomontagna, the International Mountain Museums Alliance (IMMA) and the International Alliance for Mountain Film (IAMF) held their annual general assembly meetings together for the first time in the museum's meeting area. This event, which took place on 7 May in Turin, Italy, reaffirmed Museomontagna's position as a global hub for mountain culture.

IMMA, established in 2015 at the headquarters of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations in Rome, held its 9th general assembly this year, following the previous year's assembly held in Rome. Currently comprising 10 members, including 8 European countries and two non-European countries (Nepal and Canada), IMMA operates from the Museomontagna, with Daniela Berta serving as director and coordinator.

Guests included new members such as the Alpine Museum of Bern, Switzerland, the International Mountain Museum of Pokhara, Nepal, and the Musée Savoisien of Chambéry, France, as well as the Messner Mountain Museum, the Basque Museum of Mountaineering, and the Mountain Partnership Secretariat, an honorary member since 2023.

During the meeting, two new membership applications from the Karkonosze Museum in Jelenia Góra, Poland, and the Valtellinese Museum of History and Art in Sondrio were unanimously accepted. The upcoming IMMA assemblies are scheduled for Sabadell, Spain in May 2025 and Pokhara, Nepal in 2026.

IAMF, established in Turin in 2000, is a key entity in mountain cinema, boasting 26 members from 20 countries across Europe, Asia, North and South America, and Oceania. The association operates from the Documentation Area of the Museomontagna, with Marco Ribetti serving as deputy director and coordinator.

Representatives from 17 sector festivals spanning Italy, France, Spain, Romania, the Kingdom of the Netherlands, Germany, Poland, North Macedonia, the Czech Republic, Nepal and the Republic of Korea participated in the meeting. Key discussions focused on enhancing the common IT system for film registration at IAMF festivals and planning the award ceremony for the 2024 IAMF Grand Prize winner, Renan Ozturk, scheduled for the end of May at the Telluride festival in Colorado.

The next IAMF meeting is slated for October 2024 in the Republic of Korea, hosted by the Ulju Mountain Film Festival. After the assembly, representatives from both associations engaged in discussions on recent exhibition, editorial and cinematographic projects, aiming to explore avenues for development and cooperation.

Mario Montalcini, President of the Museomontagna Commission, and Daniela Berta, Director of IMMA, expressed pride in the increasing recognition of Museomontagna and Turin as global centres for mountain culture. They emphasized the vital role of IMMA and IAMF in fostering collaboration and serving as platforms for knowledge exchange among mountain culture professionals around the world.

The day concluded with a guided tour of the museum's latest sections featuring Walter Bonatti and the Italian expedition to K2, followed by a screening of the documentary "Stati di grazia," produced by Petzl in collaboration with the Museomontagna. This was accompanied by a discussion involving Federica Mingolla, Enrico Camanni and Roberto Mantovani, shedding light on the film and its historical context.

Watch the "Stati di grazia" documentary on the Petzl Sport YouTube channel.

News and photo by Museomontagna