monographS

Visions of Avant-Garde Film: Polish Cinematic Experiments from Expressionism to Constructivism (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2016)

Synopsis: The films of Franciszka and Stefan Themerson are the only surviving Polish avant-garde films of the 1930s. While there exists a vast amount of material concerning the international character of the Themersons’ work, the period preceding them remains a distinctly under-researched field, particularly in the English-speaking world. This monograph examines the origins of Polish avant-garde film and traces its developments until 1945 and the Themersons’ last film, The Eye and the Ear. To this end, Visions of Avant-Garde Film: Polish Cinematic Experiments from Expressionism to Constructivism looks at the extent to which the early Polish avant-garde movements influenced the later practice in the field of avant-garde film. Through the careful analysis of archival sources, this study identifies the unique features of Polish avant-garde films and their discourses, as well as points of convergence with other European developments, namely those of France, Germany, Italy and Russia. Covering the period between 1896 and 1945, this project argues that it was largely through the earlier critical writings of the mid-1910s and 1920s that ideas about film were carried out into the 1940s. To assess this, it employs Ian Christie’s concept of a ‘proto-cinematic phase’, which argues for the importance of the early experiments with film, which took place internationally and outside of the canonical avant-garde movements. This book argues for the inclusion of film-related by non-cinematic interventions (unrealized film scripts) into the history of Polish avant-garde film. Lastly, this project identifies socio-political factors responsible for the birth of avant-garde film culture in Poland. It analyses the cinema’s place within Polish modernism and proposes that film played a significant and hitherto unrecognised part in formulating new cultural identity, as demonstrated in contemporary’s film relationship to graphic design, photography and photomontage.