Andrzej Wajda’s debut as a documentary director came early, when he was still a student at the Film School in Łódź. His first ever documentary, the étude (“student’s work”) entitled Pottery at Iłża (Ceramika iłżecka, 1951) focused on the work of potters in the town of Iłża. The short film had a voice-over commentary which narrated the long history of the craft in Iłża.

Four years later, the director took his cameras into the atelier of the greatest Polish sculptor, Xawery Dunikowski, to document the artist’s work. Towards the Sun (Idę do słońca, 1955) was an innovative documentary in that it showed selected sculptures in various spaces, e.g. at the seaside. Dunikowski never says a word in it. Years later, Andrzej Wajda regretted not having portrayed the sculptor by giving him an opportunity to speak.


The Andrzej Wajda Archive holds some materials relating to these two productions, among them the following:

Andrzej Wajda staged Stanisław Wyspiański’s play The Wedding twice at the Helena Modrzejewska Stary Theatre in Krakow.  The first production premiered on 26 October 1963. The cast included Zofia Więcławówna, Jerzy Nowak, Izabela Olszewska, and Zygmunt Hübner, among others. In collaboration with Jadwiga Wiesiołowska, the director also prepared the stage design. The music was composed by Jerzy Kaszycki. Wajda’s second take on Wyspianski’ play at the Stary Theatre came in 1991. Dorota Segda and Jan Peszek were given the leading roles as the Bride and Groom, with Tadeusz Huk as the Host and Jerzy Trela and Krzysztof Globisz as the Poet and the Journalist, respectively. The set was designed by Krystyna Zachwatowicz and Stanisław Radwan was responsible for the music. While making references to his previous production, Andrzej Wajda created an innovative work, saturated with references to contemporary reality.

Some of the relevant materials in the Andrzej Wajda Archive include:

 
In early 1973, Wajda’s film adaptation of The Wedding premiered at the Słowacki Theatre in Krakow. Initially, the director had intended to film a modernized version of Stanisław Wyspiański’s play in collaboration with Jerzy Andrzejewski. A memento of that idea is the surviving 1963 movie synopsis by Andrzej Kijowski (who later wrote the script for the film discussed here). Following the frustrated attempts at adjusting the play to the socio-political realities of People’s Poland, Wajda decided to work with Wyspiański’s original text. He invited actors that he had known from his earlier films to join his production: Daniel Olbrychski (as the Groom), Wojciech Pszoniak (in a dual role as the Journalist and Stańczyk), and Andrzej Łapicki (as the Poet). The role of the Bride was given to Ewa Ziętek, a student at Krakow’s Theatre School. Witold Sobociński was responsible for the cinematography and gained acclaim for his impressive footage that gave the viewer a feeling of actually taking part in the wedding reception. The music was written by Stanisław Radwan while Krystyna Zachwatowicz designed the costumes. Czesław Niemen sang the song for the hypnotic final dance scene.

We have selected the following items from the Andrzej Wajda Archive for the exhibition:

In October, we are focusing on Andrzej Wajda’s relations with Jarosław Iwaszkiewicz. The two artists exchanged correspondence from the early 1970s. The first short story by the author to be adapted for film by Wajda was ‘Brzezina’ (The Birch Wood), a philosophical tale of transience and death. The director chose Daniel Olbrychski and Olgierd Łukaszewicz for the leading roles. Visual references to Jacek Malczewski’s symbolic paintings are an important element of the film. The masterly photography of the ubiquitous nature was the work of the cameraman Zygmunt Samosiuk while the music was composed by Andrzej Korzyński. 

The Andrzej Wajda Archive contains a considerable quantity of materials relating to The Birch Wood, for example:


In 2009 Andrzej Wajda concluded his Iwaszkiewicz trilogy with Sweet Rush. While he had made evident references to Jacek Malczewski’s pictures in The Birch Wood, here he visually interpreted paintings by the American artist Edward Hopper. Being decidedly too short for a feature film, Iwaszkiewicz’s story was complemented with Krystyna Janda’s monologue on the suffering of her recently deceased husband, the prominent cinematographer Edward Kłosiński, and a short story by Sándor Márai, ‘Rendelés előtt’ as well as self-referential parts on making the film. Sweet Rush is dedicated to Edward Kłosiński. The film was shot on location in Grudziądz.

We have chosen the following of the surviving archival materials for the exhibition:


The Maids of Wilko (1979) is another adaptation of a piece by Jarosław Iwaszkiewicz, a homage to the writer. The film tells the story of Wiktor, who is going through a crisis in the aftermath of his friend’s death and decides to take a rest at his uncle’s farmstead in Rożki, near the manor of Wilko. His return to the place of his youth rekindles memories of it and the people he met there fifteen years previously. The manor is inhabited by several sisters, all of whom used to have a crush on Wiktor (great performances by Stanisława Celińska, Anna Seniuk, Christine Pascal, and Krystyna Zachwatowicz).

A Polish-French co-production, the film was nominated for the Academy Award in the foreign language category and received the Special Award of the Jury during the Polish Film Festival in Gdańsk. Andrzej Wajda used Karol Szymanowski’s Songs from Kurpie as the theme music in the film. 

Some of the relevant materials preserved in the Andrzej Wajda Archive include:

In September, to celebrate the centenary of Stanisław Lem’s birth, the Manggha Museum has prepared an exhibition focusing on joint projects by the world-famous Krakow-based author and Andrzej Wajda. In his work, the director often looked to literature for plots for his films. He felt the desire to adapt Lem’s works for the screen several times. He and the writer worked together on such projects as The Futurological Congress and Invasion from Aldebaran, but regrettably both remained unrealized. The two artists held each other’s work in high esteem, as indicated by their surviving correspondence and numerous statements in their notebooks.

Relevant items in the Andrzej Wajda Archive include for example:

The film Walesa: Man of Hope, which concludes the Man of… trilogy, reached Polish cinemas on 4 October 2013, but its world premiere has been held on 5 September, at the 70th Venice International Film Festival. The leading role of Lech Wałęsa was played by Robert Więckiewicz, with Agnieszka Grochowska as his wife, Danuta Wałęsa, and the well-known actress Maria Rosaria Omaggio as the Italian journalist Oriana Fallaci. As the plot develops, the audience are acquainted with the details of the Solidarity leader’s life, starting with the bloodily-suppressed strikes during the events of December 1970 in Gdańsk, all the way to the famous address he delivered before the combined houses of the US Congress on 15 November 1989, opening with the words ‘We the people’.

The Andrzej Wajda Archive holds various materials created during the making of this film, such as:


The film received six nominations for the Polish Film Awards: Eagles, for best actor, best set design, and best costume design, among other categories. Walesa. Man of Hope was also the Polish submission for the Oscars in 2013.

This month's presentation covers selected materials relating to one of the director's most significant films – Man of Iron – on the 40th anniversary of its premiere (27 July 1981). The idea for the film was born among the shipyard crew when Wajda was documenting the workers' talks with the government in August 1980. With a screenplay by Aleksander Ścibor-Rylski, the plot follows up on the Birkut family, the protagonists of Man of Marble. Man of Iron became a monument to the Solidarity movement. Years later Wajda said on several occasions that it had been the only film that he made 'to order'.

Man of Iron met with an enthusiastic reception abroad, receiving the Palme d'Or at Cannes and an Oscar nomination for best foreign language film in 1982.

The Andrzej Wajda Archive contains a sizeable collection of materials relating to the making of this film, notably:

The director’s preparations for making the film Man of Marble began as early as the 1960s. The first draft for it was written in 1963, but the script was rejected for political reasons. It was not until 1976 that Andrzej Wajda received approval for making the film, which finally reached the cinemas on 25 February 1977. He cast young actors, Krystyna Janda and Jerzy Radziwiłowicz, in the leading roles. Krystyna Zachwatowicz-Wajda also played in that film, as Hanka Tomczyk, the wife of Mateusz Birkut – the shock worker that is the central character around whom the whole story revolves. The music was composed by Andrzej Korzyński. The following materials relating to Man of Marble are preserved in the Andrzej Wajda Archive:

 
Towards the end of his life, Andrzej Wajda said in an interview with reference to Man of Marble: ‘This is the best, the most original script I’ve had at my disposal in my whole long life.’ Wajda followed up on the story of the Birkut family five years later in the film Man of Iron.

Some of the oldest mementos and souvenirs kept by Andrzej Wajda in his private archive date back to his childhood. Born on 6 March 1926 in Suwałki, Wajda moved shortly thereafter with his whole family to Radom, where his father was a company commander in the 72nd Infantry Regiment. Items that have survived from his early childhood include an ample collection of photographs depicting the future filmmaker with his parents and brother. In one of these, Andrzej and his brother Leszek, a year younger than him, both of preschool age, are seated on their mother Aniela’s lap, embracing each other tenderly.

The Wajdas often visited their relations in Kraków. One of these trips was well documented: over a dozen photographs have survived, showing Andrzej Wajda and his family strolling around the Old Town and exploring the nooks and narrow streets of the historic city. Andrzej had a unique rapport with his father, whom he accompanied in his travels around the country, studying its history. Wajda senior took his teenage son to art exhibitions, introduced him to fine society, and encouraged him to seek his own path in life. Objects from those school years that have survived to our times include certificates and class photos, but perhaps the most crucial memento from the period is a small friendship book bound in wood, with pro memoriam entries by teachers and schoolmates.

This year’s celebrations of Andrzej Wajda’s 95th birthday provide an opportunity to offer a broader insight into the biography of this great cinema artist, but also prominent theatre director, co-writer of film scripts, civic and social activist, lover of literature, and last but not least, good friend. As with all of us, his story begins with his childhood.