The Golden Age of the small screen
The era of Swiss television began in 1953. An exhibition in Basel sheds light on a cultural phenomenon that became a fixture in almost every household, despite initial hesitation and suspicion.
‘The box – 60 years of television between illusion and reality’ tells the history of television in the German-speaking part of Switzerland, from its beginnings in Basel and Zurich to the present day. The exhibition examines the power of moving images.
There is no doubt television has changed our daily lives dramatically over the past decades. In the early days the programme schedule only ran for a few hours. Later the number of channels multiplied and nowadays it is hard to keep count.
A relatively new trend is television on demand. This innovation has led to a steady decline in the traditional use of television despite an ever increasing range of programmes.
The exhibition at the Basel History Museum displays a wealth of archive material from the Swiss Broadcasting Corporation, swissinfo.ch’s parent company.
It also shows many treasures belonging to television viewers. An impressive 400 objects are on display: films, scripts, pictures, production notes and props for use on and off camera.
(Text: Gaby Ochsenbein)
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