Oblíbený Z Poland

An experimental documentary. Using several series of static shots, the film depicts the lives of the residents of a housing estate.

A documentary film experiment consisting of repeating the same sequence of shots ten times, depicting a flowerpot falling from a tenement window. The shots gradually lengthen, revealing new details about the world depicted.

A series of film experiments carried out by visual artists during the Biennale of Spatial Forms in Elbląg in 1973.

First film by Włodzimierz Puchalski, that headstarted his career as a nature filmmaker. His photo album came out under the same name in 1951.

A performance staged during the WRO 96 festival, entitled Monitor Polski. The artist presented a device in which his body was a conductor through which electricity flowed, with the voltage gradually increased at the artist's request and with the participation of the audience. Interest in the phenomenon of energy and reflection on artistic creation had already appeared in Robakowski's earlier works, such as O palcach (About Fingers, 1982) and Moje Videomasochizmy (My Videomasochisms, 1989).

The violent text resonates with the harsh energy of the music videos—for instance Powietrza (More Air), 1986, in which the band frantically cries for oxygen in then politically oppressive Poland. Robakowski’s recurrent appearance in his own videos could easily be seen as narcissistic, but his collaboration with Mowska demonstrates where his allegiances lie—with the rebellious spirits.

A filmed portrait of Professor Tadeusz Reichstein, discoverer of cortisone and holder of the patent for the production of vitamin C, a Nobel Prize laureate in Physiology or Medicine in 1950. Born in Włocławek at the end of the nineteenth century, Professor Reichstein lectures in Basel and holds Swiss citizenship. A man of remarkable modesty who avoids the media, he nevertheless makes an exception for Polish journalists. In the film, he speaks about his life and scientific career.

An instructional video on the ongoing replacement of freight wagons, commissioned by the Ministry of Transport. The narrator describes the various stages of the repair process performed by specialized workers.

Several true stories from the 1930s about Stalin’s repressions. One of them tells about a Gomel official who survived an execution in the infamous Novobelitsky (Chonkovsky) forest near Gomel.

Even on the most difficult day, filled with exhausting conversations in a foreign language and gathering documents, I always find twenty minutes during my tram ride to dream about the little “secrets” I notice around me — like the horse that appeared at the stop.

Eliza, an elderly woman with Alzheimer's, lives in a house filled with reminder notes and family photos. She records daily videos and revisits old diaries and tapes to preserve her sense of self. As her memories slowly return in fragments, she discovers her own forgotten diary and realizes she may have lost more than just her memories.

Some conversations are more important than words. Two girls, one meeting over coffee and a game that can be more than fun. They start a sentence with ‘I’d rather…’, but it’s the smiles, glances and unspoken gestures that really tell their story.

Shot on a miniature set, the film gradually reveals the mechanisms of control and discipline in schools, symbolised by oversized gymnastics vaults and a multiplied number of scales in the nurse’s office.

Comprised of newsreel footage, this documentary takes viewers on an extraordinary journey through Warsaw. It shows the capital before World War II, the wartime devastation, and the early years of reconstruction.