Michał Bobrowski, Radosław Bomba
Poza ekranem kinowym. Postmedialne konteksty animacji
UMCS, Lublin 2021
978-83-227-9534-7, 148 pages

In this monograph authors set for themselves an uneasy, yet without doubt, intriguing goal – mapping animation against the background of post-media landscape, in which media function as Geertz`s “clouded genres”.  In two parts of this volume, this framework allows us to take a closer look at various historical lines – videos, especially animation, which since its onset constituted an entity separate from film, in the spirit of media archeology possible to be fitted in connections other than the cinematographic ones, yet, also connected with other “post-cinema” animations, from GIFs to immersive installations, to data visualizations. In order to tackle the analysis of such a scope of topics, which additionally combine various registers, from amateur works, to commercial productions to avant-garde, Michał Bobrowski and Radosław Bomba make use of a vast palette of theoretical references. It is indispensable and at the same time of informative value because this whole area clearly escapes traditional categorizations. […]

Beyond the cinema screen it seems to form a catalogue, a theoretical and historical guidebook through selected media of the epoch, in which the semantic scope of the term “medium” becomes non-obvious. Even more: it is a return visit into the past, which reminds us that the stability of older forms was an illusion waiting to be exposed, like the glitch esthetics referred to in the text. Authors also open field for further exploration because reading whets appetite and leads to further questions, for example, about the social circulation of the discussed images and sounds. Finally – it offers a new “audiovisual agreement” by appreciating sound, everlastingly marginalized in favour of image.

From the review by Mirosław Filiciak, professor at SWPS

More information: https://wydawnictwo.umcs.eu/produkt/5426/poza-ekranem-kinowym-postmedialne-konteksty-animacji

EMISSIONS:

2nd December 2022 – 11 AM
Małopolska Garden of Arts - Small Screening Room

MICHAŁ BOBROWSKI

Assistant professor in the Institute of Culture Studies at Maria Curie-Skłodowska University in Lublin (Faculty of Philology) since 2018. PhD specializing in film theory (he defended his thesis in 2010 at the Jagiellonian University). His research interests include classical Japanese and American cinema, animation, Cold War film propaganda (USA, USSR, Yugoslavia). In 2012 he published a book Akira Kurosawa. Artysta Pogranicza. In 2016 a monograph Obsession, Perversion, Rebellion. Twisted Dreams of Central European Animation was published, which he co-authored, and in 2019 it was continued by Propaganda, Ideology, Animation. Twisted Dreams of History (which he again co-authored). This book was nominated for the McLaren-Lambart Award for Best Scholarly Book on Animation for years 2019-2020 awarded by the Society for Animation Studies. Together with Radosław Bomba, he co-authored a book Poza ekranem kinowym. Postmedialne konteksty animacji, published in 2021. He is programme director and co-founder of StopTrik International Film Festival (Slovenia/Poland), a festival devoted to stop motion animation. He cooperates with numerous European festivals and film institutions as curator and culture activist. He speaks English, Serbo-Croatian and Russian.

RADOSŁAW BOMBA

Researcher, academic teacher, digital  culture animator. He graduated from Maria Curie-Skłodowska University in Lublin majoring in culture studies and sociology; he also completed postgraduate studies Protection of Intellectual Property (Maria Curie-Skłodowska University in Lublin, 2014) and Computer Graphic Design and DTP (Maria Curie-Skłodowska University in Lublin, 2015). Since 2006, he has worked in the Institute of Culture Studies at Maria Curie-Skłodowska University in Lublin, where having obtained his PhD (2012) he became assistant professor, and since 2021 – professor. He is interested in knowledge visualization, digital humanities, culture analytics, anthropological aspects of computer games, game studies, cyberculture, digital culture, new media and their influence on social and cultural transformations. He has been teaching at Maria Curie-Skłodowska University for 15 years. He has also taught at the SWPS University in Warsaw (2015-2018), John Paul II University in Krakow (2020/21) and WSEI University in Lublin (2019/20). Apart from teaching and researching, he has actively cooperated with numerous scientific and cultural institutions, such as National Centre for Culture, National Audiovisual Institute, National Library, Medialab Katowice, Digital Humanities Centre at the Institute of Literary Research of the Polish Academy of Sciences, Modern Poland Foundation, Gdynia City Museum, The “Grodzka Gate – NN Theatre” Centre, 5medium Foundation, City Culture Institute in Gdansk, Centre for the Meeting of Cultures in Lublin, Lublin Gamedev Foundation, IT Promotion Centre in Warsaw. In 2015 he worked as media education expert for the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage. In 2013-2017 he was director of the Culture Theory postgraduate programme. Since 2018, he is the director of Video Games Research Centre at Maria Curie-Skłodowska University in Lublin. In 2006-2017 he was deputy editor-in-chief of the scientific magazine “Culture and History”. Editor of numerous internet portals (among others History and Media, Knowledge and Education). Member of Polish Culture Studies Association (since 2005), Games Research Association of Poland (since 2007) and Polish Association of Film and Media Research.