The Cinématographe and the Question of Invention

When the Lumière Cinématographe was invented, was cinema invented too? And was the Cinématographe a true invention, or only an innovation within an ensemble of machines already well in place by 1895? These are certainly among the most debated questions in the historiography of cinema, and in its technological historiography in particular. They reappeared on a regular basis, in particular at the time of ‘anniversaries’ of the invention (1925, 1935, etc.), before being revived for other reasons by the transformation to digital encoding.

An initial response to these questions has been proposed, for example, by André Gaudreault in his article ‘On Some Limitations of the Definition of the Dispositive “Cinema”‘: it points out the indisputable difference between the cultural phenomenon cinema and the Cinématographe (Illus. 26), which is, ‘basically and quite simply […] only […] a machine to shoot views – extraordinary and brilliantly designed, to be sure, but a machine all the same.’ When cinema was invented is essentially a poor question, a false problem: ‘Who invented cinema? Answer: the cinema cannot be invented (there is no patent to be registered): it becomes established, gradually and collectively’.