Persconferentie over het aankomend Europees Cultuur Congres (en)

A news conference highlighting the programme and objectives of the forthcoming European Culture Congress began at the stroke of noon on 22nd August 2011 at Wroclaw’s Lower Silesian Film Centre (the former Warszawa cinema). The start of the Congress, one of the most significant events of the Polish Presidency i, is only three weeks away. Taking the floor at the news conference were Bogdan Zdrojewski, Minister of Culture and National Heritage, Wroclaw Mayor RafalDutkiewicz and MichalMerczynski, director of the National Audio-Visual Institute who unveiled the Congress programme.

‘Today the Congress programme and the scope of preparations for it transcend the limits of the imagination but certainly not its possibilities,’ Culture Minister Bogdan Zdrojewski told the news conference. He described the September Congress as the culmination of the great hopes pinned on Poland’s EU Council Presidency in the cultural realm.

Minister Zdrojewski and the Mayor of Wroclaw agreed that Wroclawculture was in the process of building the most lasting and excellent quality symbols of Polish culture, of which the Congress will be an exemplification. ‘Several events have inscribed themselves in gold letters in the symbolic memory of Wroclaw. The first was the 1948 congress of intellectuals, the second was Pope John Paul’s pilgrimage at the time of the great flood in 1997, and the European Culture Congress of 2011 has a chance of taking its place amongst them,’ remarked Mayor Rafal Dutkiewicz.

MichalMerczynski, director of the National Audio-Visual Institute, recalled the motto of the forthcoming Congress: Art for Social Change — culture as a tool serving social transformation. He also drew attention to the uniqueness of the event, especially as regards its interdisciplinary character. That will make it possible to meld meetings of EU culture ministers, debates on contemporary culture, interactive workshops and various artistic disciplines including music, architecture, theatre, design, film and the latest art forms into a single event. This four-day cultural festival is a once-in-a-lifetime project. Between the 8thand 11thSeptember, scores of interdisciplinary artistic projects will make their début. ‘The Congress will offer opportunities to meet outstanding artists in various fields, politicians, non-governmental organisations, philosophers and activists as well as ordinary people,’ MichalMerczynski explained. While presenting the Congress programme he emphasised the role that participating non-governmental organisations have played in preparing this event.

The conference’s crowning touch will be the screening of Pawel Mykietyn’s special work 3 for 13 in 3D technology, recorded by the National Audio-Visual Institute in September 2010 during the Sacrum Profanum Festival in Kraków. 3 for 13 is part of a Made in Polandpublishing project, prepared by the National Audio-Visual Institute specially for the European Culture Congress.

The European Culture Congress, taking place on 8th-11thSeptember in Wroclaw, is one of the most important events of the Polish Presidency’s National Cultural Programme, for whose conception and implementation, by the decision of the Culture Minister, the National Audio-Visual Institute is responsible.

More information is available at: www.culturecongress.eu and www.uwaganakulture.pl