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Masters of Polish animation 1

Saturday 25 Aug 3pm

See also Masters of Polish animation 2
Sunday 26 August 3pm

Polish animation holds a very special position in the hearts of all fans of classic animation. Put simply, Polish animation is superb. Any list of ‘best ever’ animators is going to have a strong contingent from Poland embedded in it. Indeed, animation has been created in Poland from the earliest days of cinema with the examples dating back to pre-1920s. Poles were also among the first to utilise animation for making commercials with examples of those works to be found in the 1930s.

Animation historian Giannalberto Bendazzi describes the themes of Polish as animation as a “sense of absurdity, surrealism and anguished settings”. All true but to this could also be added a love of complex, adult fairytales and a willingness to take the best from western and eastern visual influences.
The names of the finest Polish animators stand high on any list of master animators. Zofia Oraczewska, Jan Lenica, Jerzy Kucia, Zbigniew Rybczynski, Piotr Dumala. Walerian Borowczyk and Ladislaw Starewicz produced some of the finest animated films ever screened.

Recently, the Pompidou Centre in Paris curated an enormous collection of Polish Masters and these two programs owe a great deal to that fine inspiration. We also owe a very large “Thank You” to Marlena Lukasiak of the Polish Cultural Institute in London and Helena Dametka of Filmoteka Narodowa in Warsaw. This collection is but a glimpse of an incredible community of animators creating a strong, robust, challenging, superb body of truly original work – but what a glimpse.

Once upon a time / byl sobie raz
Jan Lenica & Walerian Borowczyk
1975, 9'00


Labyrinth / labirynt
Jan Lenica
1962, 15'00

Little black riding hood / czarny kapturek
Piotr Dumala
1983, 6'00

Cages/klatki
Miroslaw Kijowicz
1966, 9'00

The wind / wiatr
Stefan Schabenbeck
1970, 7'00

The return / powrot
Jerzy Kucia
1972, 9'00

Little western / maly western
Witold Giersz
1960, 6'25