Film Restored – Workshop report and screening – ‘Europa’ – lost and rediscovered gem of futurism

›Europa‹, PL 1931, D: Stefan and Franciszka Themerson, 11 min
›Europa II‹, PL 1988, D: Piotr Zarębski, 14 min

Introduction: Daniel Bird, Łukasz Ceranka (Fixafilm)
In English

In 1931, the Polish-Jewish artists, writers and filmmakers, Franciszka and Stefan Themerson, shot the film ‘Europa’ (PL 1931), based on a poem by Anatol Stern. This avant-garde work consisting of five short films was considered lost for decades. In this workshop report, the changing reception of Franciszka and Stefan Themerson’s ‘Europa’ is charted, from the Polish reviews at the time of its release, through to Stefan Themerson’s own writings about the film, various attempts to reimagine it when all its elements were missing, and the rediscovery of a single print in the German Federal Archives some eighty years later. This workshop report will include presentations of the retrieved ‘Europa’, and two later attempts to reconstruct it. It will also include the comparison of the raw and restored versions and highlight the challenges of the process.

→ Register until 13 Oct 2023 at registration_fr [at] deutsche-kinemathek.de (registration_fr[at]deutsche-kinemathek[dot]de) | Single tickets for all festival screenings are available via the Kino Arsenal website.