"KANTOR'S CIRCLE" AWARDED IN MONTREAL

"Kantor's Circle" was given the Award for the Best Educational Film at the 34th International Festival of Films on Art in Montreal.

During the ten-day long festival, 170 films and works in the media arts from 25 countries of the world were shown. Among the award-winners, there is the Polish documentary film "Kantor's Circle," directed by Adrianna and Iwo Książek.

"Kantor's Circle" is a film about Polish young people, who created and developed art in the underground, in defiance of the German occupants.

In Krakow, during World War II, Tadeusz Kantor gathered around himself a group of talented visual artists, the majority of whom were derived from the German School of Arts and Crafts (Kunstgewerbeschule), under the aegis of which the conspirational Academy of Fine Arts was hidden. In 1942, Tadeusz Kantor founded together with them the Independent Theatre and gave two performances in private apartments, "Balladyna" and "The Return of Odysseus." "The art which was born then, was born out of danger and was born against the danger, " wrote Professor Mieczysław Porębski. During this time, the following people met: Jerzy Nowosielski, Tadeusz Brzozowski, Jerzy Skarżyński, Wojciech Jerzy Has, Marek Rostworowski, Jerzy Turowicz, Ewa Krakowska…

The film contains a number of archival materials: film, photographs and reproductions of previously unknown paintings and drawings from the times of German occupation.

The full list of award-winning films is available here.