Walerian Borowczyk & Jan Lenica, House, 1958, Poland, 10’57”

House (Dom)
Directors: Walerian Borowczyk and Jan Lenica (Poland, 1958, 11 minutes)
This was the last joint work of the animation giants Lenica and Borowczyk. Influenced by the French avant-garde films of the 1920s, in House a conventional storyline is replaced by a succession of scenes in several flats of a Secession-era apartment house. In one chamber a wig comes to life and drinks milk from a bottle, in another two fencers from old photographs are dueling, and in yet another a woman kisses the head of a mannequin. Grand Prix, Brussels International Experimental Film Competition, 1958.

Jan Lenica, Labyrinth, 1962, Poland, 14’14”

Labyrinth (Labirynt)
Director: Jan Lenica (Poland, 1962, 14 minutes)
Director Lenica's most acclaimed work is a Kafka-esque tale – a gripping, metaphorical portrait of totalitarian society. Using collage that is reminiscent of Max Ernst, Labyrinth is the story of a man who flies to a large unfamiliar city on wings of his own design. Grand Prix, Oberhausen, 1982.

Tango
Director: Zbigniew Rybczynski (Poland, 1980, 8 minutes)
Rybczynski’s soaring imagination and technical ingenuity has long influenced the world of film, and this hypnotic work won the Oscar for Best Animated Short in 1982, among many other prizes. A group of characters appear within the space of a one-room apartment, as if seen by a static camera in one long single shot, and criss-cross on their separate rounds without apparently noticing each other, one by one at first until there’s a swarming throng.

Zbigniew Rybczynski, Tango, 1980, Poland, 7’54”

Ewa Bibanska, Unfaithful Portrait, 1981, Poland, 7’00”

Unfaithful Portrait (Portret niewierny)
Director: Ewa Bibanska (Poland, 1981, 7 minutes)
A brilliant illustration of a relationship, told entirely by animated cut-outs of heads set against vivid backgrounds.

Piotr Dumala, Little Black Riding Hood, 1983, Poland, 5’17"

Little Black Riding Hood (Czarny kapturek)
Director: Piotr Dumala (Poland, 1982, 5 minutes)
On the way to grandmother’s house, collecting flowers along the path, Little Black Riding Hood is seized by an inexplicable fury. Director Dumala’s unique and painstaking method of painting and scratching the pictures into glass creates a painterly look.

For My Mother and Me (Mojej Mamie i sobie)
Director: Mariusz Wilczynski (Poland, 2000, 2 minutes)
The wryly told story of the negative influence of an overprotective mother by one of Poland’s most influential contemporary artists.