Workshop report and screening: Europa – lost and rediscovered gem of futurism

In 1931, the Polish-Jewish artists, writers and filmmakers, Franciszka and Stefan Themerson, shot the film EUROPA, 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.

Program:
EUROPA Stefan und Franciszka Themerson Poland 1931 Original version with English subtitles DCP 11 min.
EUROPA II Piotr Zarębski Poland 1988 Original version with English subtitles DCP 14 min.