PIYE 2012

MHŻP, 16 November 2016
Twenty people from Poland and Israel, four difficult subjects, one week of intensive work – and the result: four exceptional short films. As well as hours of conversation, new experiences, often a change of previously held opinions. These are the first effects of this year’s edition of PIYE – the Polish Intercultural Youth Encounters.

The premiere screening, which took place on September 11th at Kino Kultura, brought together over 150 people – people connected to the Museum and to the project itself, representatives of non-governmental organizations or state and local institutions interested in the subject as well as devotees of documentary films.

Divided into groups, the students from both countries were assigned four topics – their task was to work through their subject; overseen by film experts and with the help of operators, demonstrating extraordinary imagination and approaching the subjects from a perspective unanticipated by the organizers, they created four short, condensed images. Four descriptions of a reality previously unknown to them and now told from their point of view.

1. The development of modern Polish-Jewish institutions in Poland. Film title: 12 Hours

The group overseen by Julia Popławska produced a condensed view of a day in the life of Jewish institutions in Warsaw: starting with morning prayer and ending with an evening at the Jewish theatre.

2. Preserving the memory of Polish Jews in the Polish collective consciousness. Film title: A Place

Group headed by Małgorzata Kozera-Topińska – a collection of interviews with the inhabitants of a building on Zlota St. and students from the Sienkiewicz High School which cares for a surviving fragment of the ghetto wall. The film creates a parable of the place, touching on the past, the present and the notion of presence.

3. The involvement of young Poles and young Polish Jews in promoting knowledge about Jewish history and culture in Poland. Film title: Vacuum

Group led by Filip Jacobson – the story of Rafał Betlejewski and his artistic project “I miss you, Jew”, recounting the artist’s original actions and revealing his motivations as well as the ideas he was guided by.

4. Korczak – Pole, Jew, Human Being. The figure of the writer and his educational ideas as the common heritage of Poles and Israelis.

The group, overseen by Katarzyna Kural, focused on showing the last road taken by Janusz Korczak and his pupils from the orphanage.

The screening was accompanied by a discussion with the young creators, moderated by Dr. Małgorzata Pakier, which also involved members of the audience. The debate quickly moved beyond issues related to the making of the films, shedding light on the students’ personal experience, their perception of history and  of Polish-Israeli relations before the exchange, and now, having taken part in it.

The films we had a chance to see at Kino Kultura will be available on the Museum of the History of Polish Jews website.

In the fall, they will also travel with the Polish participants of the exchange to Israel, where they will be shown in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.

source: jewishmuseum.org.pl