Július 4., Varsó

Modernism ? and what next?

Central European Architecture Film and Video Exchange

July 4, 2012 – 6 and 8 pm.

Kino.Lab, Centre for Contemporary Art Ujazdowski Castle

00-467 Warsaw, ul. Jazdów 2

www.kinolab.art.pl

The Warsaw screening organized by the Central European Architecture Film and Video Exchange shows various cases and histories of modernist projects coming into being in the specific political and social realities of Central and Eastern Europe, as seen from a contemporary perspective. In these films ? from Hungary, Poland, Czech Republic and Slovakia ? directors ask questions about the ways architecture grows into the social fabric and create human relationships, about the relationships between people and about the reactions it engenders. First Program: The Afterlife Modern nursery school, dir. Olga Matuszewska, Poland 2012, 10′ Behind the Iron Gate, dir. Heidrun Holzfeind, Poland 2009, 55? Slovak National Gallery, dir. Barbara Zavarská, Aleš Šedivec, Slovakia 2010, 7′ No Entry, dir. Márk Péter Vargha, Hungary 2011, 4′ This selection shows the everyday functioning of architecture, frequently after many years since its construction, in a changing historical, political and social context, whether in the case of functionalist architecture in Warsaw 1920s (Modern nursery school), mass housing solutions of the late modernism of the 1970s (Behind the Iron Gate), or in the case of the new wing of the Slovak National Gallery, founded in 1970s.The closing film, No Entry is an impression of the empty spaces of the Soviet military hospital. All these buildings still perform their original function, but their presence in the city and in the lives of the inhabitants has been reinterpreted. Because of their controversial perception their future is often uncertain, marked by the possibility of being shut down. Second Program: The intimacy of housing blocks Lekerekítés/Rounding Off, dir. L. Polyák, Z. Keserue, Á. D. Dénes, Hungary 2006-2007, 14? Petržalka Identity, dir. Juraj Chlpik, Slovakia 2010, 25? A Place to Win, dir. Petra Pelsőczy, Hungary 2011, 38? Rahova, dir. David Možný, Czech Republic 2008 6′   The selected films describe the social context of particular modernist housing projects, like the lottery houses in Budapest, in which half-complete apartments were won on the lottery (A Place to Win), the largest Bratislava housing estate Petržalka (Petržalka Identity) or the 1950s industrial town Dunaújváros in Hungary (Lekerekítés/Rounding Off). Modern architecture evolves here in the wider context, the peculiar political system and the dreams and deficiencies of Central and Eastern Europe. From the current perspective, modernism becomes another historical period, inevitably linked to the subjective, private stories of people, for whom architecture created the frame of their lives. Curators of the Warsaw screening: Kaja Pawełek i Katarzyna Boratyn. Kino.Lab Centre for Contemporary Art Ujazdowski Castle 00-467 Warsaw ul. Jazdów 2 www.kinolab.art.pl Project co-funded by the Visegrad Fund.