Saturday, June 3 | 5:30 & 8 pm
The final film by leading Polish auteur Andrzej Wajda (Ashes and Diamonds), Afterimage presents an illuminating and inspiring biographical portrait of internationally renowned Polish avant-garde painter and aesthetic theorist, Władysław Strzemiński. Daring to publicly oppose the Sot realist style imposed by the Stalinist ministry of culture, Strzemiński is removed from his position at the Łódź School of Fine Arts and exiled from the state sanctioned artistic community. Despite the support of his adoring former students, Strzemiński, who was severely wounded in WWI, struggles to complete his life’s work as his personal circumstances grow increasingly dire. Masterfully directed by ninety-year-old Wajda, whose balanced, painterly compositions find aesthetic beauty in the midst of privation and despair, Afterimage is at once a beautifully acted character study; a compelling and frequently harrowing historical drama; and an astute philosophical meditation on the nature, function, and life-sustaining power of art.
Director Andrzej Wajda 2016 In Polish with English subtitles 98 minutes NR DCP
