MIASTOmovie 10

The anniversary edition of the City and Architecture Film Festival will be held under the title: A MATTER OF TASTE. Throughout the past nine editions, we have often looked at the form of architecture in our meetings, discussions, and other events. We have, however, focused on “higher values” and paid more attention to the ideas behind the projects, and their applicability or innovativeness.

This year, we want to comprehensively discuss the visual aspects of architecture and urban/spatial planning, together with invited specialists and festival participants.

Therefore, we have chosen a subject that is familiar to all: the aesthetic experience of architecture. It is an issue in many discussions and is often countered with the phrase, “It’s a matter of taste”. With the 10th edition of MIASTOmovie, we want to prove that tastes can be discussed and that it can be done in a substantive and elegant manner.

One of the themes we want to explore in the upcoming edition will be an attempt to identify the aesthetics of the 21st century. With the focus on the functions of architecture – usability, sustainability, or flexibility – are we paying attention to its form? It is fair to say that, more than 100 years after the emergence of the International Style in architecture, followed by the socialist realist and postmodernist upheavals, we have returned to it for longer and are still practicing it under the guise of neo-modernism. But at the same time, it is sad that in the field of aesthetics we have achieved neutrality and predictability, embodied by aesthetic blandness.

After years of minimalism, can we look forward to the return of detail, of tiny visual frenzies? Is it even appropriate to talk about such whims when we are in the midst of climate, pandemic, and war crises? It is in the context of zero-emission design and construction that we will consider whether it is environmentalism that is our current style. A style that is very diverse, but with a clear and defined purpose.

We will also stop to reflect on urban planning, evoking the concept of ‘spatial order’ and reaching towards the ”new urbanism”. We will ask ourselves what actually is an orderly space, that is developed according to clear rules, and how is it supposed to be created in order to be good and beautiful at the same time. We will talk about what landscape harmony means to us and about the kind of space composition we need today.

We will look at two very distinct architectural styles – historicism and postmodernism, in terms of the emotions associated with them. Why are we annoyed by real ruins, but love to visit buildings styled like ones? Why do we like color in interiors or in clothing, but find it objectionable on the facades of buildings? What makes us think that some spaces are worth rebuilding and restoring, while other works of architecture are demolished and forgotten?

In this collection of topics, it will be important for us to focus on the characteristics of Polish aesthetics and to analyze the current boom in its peculiarity, honesty, and fantasy. After a period of mocking self-made structures (e.g. garden sheds), ridiculing ‘TypoPolo’ (the amateur designs of advertisements and signboards), and condemning suburban mansions, we seem to have moved from acceptance to fascination with our native eclecticism. Drawing on the 1990s nostalgia, but also on the new spatial creations embedded in the capitalism of the early millennium, we will consider whether there is a method to this Polish chaos.

We will surely not be able to avoid the problem of over-aestheticization and building one’s image solely on projects that are generally considered to be nice and pretty. More importantly, we will examine the examples of the impact of such ideality on the social and economic aspects of city life.

With the 10th edition of MIASTOmovie, we want to inspire you to an honest reflection: is it what’s on the inside that counts in the everyday experience of architecture, or is the “packaging” also important? Is the form of architecture just a matter of taste?

See you!

MIASTOteam

Organized by: Wrocław Film Foundation

Co-organizers: The New Horizons Cinema, The National Institute of Architecture and Urban Planning

Strategic Partner: Profit Development

Funding: Municipality of Wrocław, Ministry of Culture and National Heritage