The 11th edition of the 2026 Europa Cinemas Audience Development & Innovation Lab in Sofia brought together 28 participants from 14 different countries. The afternoon began with a warm welcome from Deputy Director of Sofia International Film Festival, Mira Staleva and Executive Director for the National Film Center in Bulgaria, Peter Todorov. “Cinema is a fight and it is a passion,” Staleva said, addressing the room, and emphasising the importance of the network, “This is the community that we have.” While the majority of film funding goes to production rather than exhibition, her impassioned message was clear: “Here we can share our problems and our dreams – and we can come together with our ideas.”

Lab leaders Maeve Cooke (Director at access CINEMA in Ireland), Caro Raedts (Co-ordinator at Cinema ZED in Belgium), and Ioana Dragomirescu (Cinema Manager at Cinema Timişoara – Victoria, Timiş & Studio), outlined the schedule for the four days, which will cover a range of signtificant topics facing the sector today: cinema brand and identity, specialised programming and events, building an online identity, audience demographics, using AI tools, inclusion and accessibility, as well as how other Europa Cinemas initiatives from Collaborate to Innovate to Boot Camps can further assist network members in growing and sustaining their audiences for European and arthouse cinema.

Reminding the participants that risk and reward go hand-in-hand but also that new discoveries – whether they are successful or not – are at the heart of cinema innovation, Dragomirescu encouraged a spirit of trying new things: “We are all learning from each other and sometimes mistakes are the best way to learn,” she said.

Participants then arranged themselves in order from the oldest operating cinema (1907, Moviemento in Berlin) to the newest (2024) and briefly introduced another to the room.

Historic timeline of cinemas built among this year’s participants

1907 – Moviemento, Berlin, Germany

1909 – Kino Lucerna, Prague, Czech Republic

1919 – Kino ART + Kino KIT, Brno, Czech Republic

1924 – Kinodvor, Ljubljana, Slovenia

1926 – Vlaykova, Sofia, Bulgaria

1926 – Bio Fågel Blå, Stockholm, Sweden

1927 – Cinema Odeon, Bologna, Italy

1931 – Cinema Victoria Cluj, Romania

1945 – Dolnoslaskie Centrum Filmowe (Lower Silesian Film Centre), Wroclaw, Poland

1955 – Kino Sõprus, Tallinn, Estonia

1963 – Cinema Teatro Don Bosco, Rome, Italy

1976 – Lumière Maastricht, Maastricht, Netherlands

1981 – Cinema Lumiere, Sofia, Bulgaria

1978 – LantarenVenster, Rotterdam, Netherlands 

2006 – Budascoop, Kortrijk, Belgium

2000 – Schaubühne Lindenfels, Leipzig, Germany

2010 – Caravana TIFF, mobile cinema, Romania

2011 – Cinema RITCS, Brussels, Belgium

2012 – Kino Pałacowe, Poznan, Poland

2013 & 2016 – Cinema Trivale and Cinema Carpati, Pitesti and Sinaia, Romania

2014 – Cesis Cinema, Cēsis, Latvia

2016 – Kino Central im Bürgerbräu, Würzburg, Germany

2023 – CKM Sinemasi, Istanbul, Turkey

2024 – Cines Embajadores Foncalada, Oviedo, Spain