The CineFest Miskolc International Film Festival has been honoring outstanding filmmakers since 2008, and since 2016 it has also selected a director or actor as an Ambassador of European Cinema. The festival pays tribute to its past winners with an exhibition in the House of Arts.

The Lifetime Achievement Award was first given to Lívia Gyarmathy and the Ambassador of European Cinema Award to Juliette Binoche. The presence and the masterclasses of the awardees are the  highlights of CineFest and a key part of the program. Since then, Sławomir Idziak, the brilliant Polish cinematographer, his no less brilliant Hungarian colleague, the Oscar-winning Vilmos Zsigmond, the divine diva Claudia Cardinale, Miklós Jancsó, Károly Makk, István Szabó, Marcell Jankovics, and István Hildebrand have received the award.

Awardees include Oscar-winning Bille August, legendary James Bond actor George Lazenby, French cinema daredevil Tony Gatlif, and leading figures in Central European cinema such as the President of the European Film Academy Agnieszka Holland and Oscar-winner Jíři Menzel. Menzel’s co-creator Magda Vášáryova, the unforgettable Maryska of Cutting it Short,  as well as great Polish artists, actor Daniel Olbrychski and director Krzysztof Zanussi, the darling of millions Franco Nero and his Oscar-winning wife, one of the greatest actresses in universal cinema, Vanessa Redgrave were named as ambassadors of European Cinema in previous years.

The exhibition is open free of charge.