History

Over the past decades, DOK.fest München has developed into a renowned public festival that is exclusively committed to socially relevant and artistically valuable documentary film.

The start

The International Documentary Film Festival Munich was founded by the Munich Documentary Filmmakers Association (AG DOK). The declared goal was a "festival of the festivals" for the Munich audience, with an emphasis on the promotion of creative documentary films, which at the time played only a marginal role in movie theatres in West-Germany. In cooperation with the Filmstadt München, an association of local film initiatives, the 1st DOK.fest München was launched in 1985 with city support. Gudrun Geyer was appointed director and ran the festival until 2001.

Under Gudrun Geyer's influence and direction, a large, internationally recognized festival arose, in the mid-nineties comparable only to the festivals in Amsterdam, Nyon, Yamagata or Leipzig. Almost all internationally renowned documentary filmmakers have visited Munich in the past two decades. The number of films grew from the first modest beginnings in 1985 to around 200 films at the 16th International Documentary Film Festival in 2001.

The DOK.fest grows

After Gudrun Geyer's resignation in 2001, Hermann Barth took over the task of further profiling the festival in Munich, Germany and worldwide on behalf of the newly founded International Documentary Film Festival Association. Since 2002, the festival has been operating under the brand name DOK.fest with an expanded programme.

DOK.fest München offers a review of the most important films of the year, accompanies filmographies of renowned filmmakers, supports filmmakers from so-called ‘low production countries’, ensures sustainable connections between established and up-and-coming filmmakers - and above all works to achieve the greatest possible impact for artistic documentary film.

In the following years, sponsors, distributors, professionals and audiences accepted DOK.fest München as their Munich festival - programmed in prestigious cinemas such as ARRI, Atelier and Filmmuseum, DOK.fest München reached more and more viewers with an exclusive programme.

In 2009, Hermann Barth resigned from the festival.

The DOK.fest today

The new festival director is Daniel Sponsel with the initial managerial support of Christian Pfeil. This collaboration gave rise to the DOK.tour series. Daniel Sponsel relies on the proven successful concept of Germany's largest festival for long documentary films and expands it with the new series DOK.deutsch, DOK.guest, the Retrospective and the educational programme DOK.education. He also launched the DOK.forum in 2011: Since then, the industry and newcomer platform has offered industry professionals and interested parties a broad spectrum of current topics to explore the perspective of documentary work.

Since 2019, DOK.fest München is the largest documentary film festival in Germany and has become one of the most relevant platforms for documentary film in Europe.

Due to COVID-19 containment measures, the festival temporarily took place online in 2020 and 2021. In 2022 and 2023, the festival and the educational platform DOK.education were held in dual format, on the digital screen and at home on the screen. The industry platform DOK.forum (marketplace and perspectives) took place hybrid in 2022 and 2023 – both on-site and online at the same time.