European Film Awards 2016 go to Wroclaw

At a press conference at the Wroclaw City Hall, the European Film Academy announced its decision to hold the 2016 European Film Awards in Wroclaw. The announcement was made on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of the founding of the European Film Academy on 1st April 1989 in Berlin and 640 days before Wroclaw will become European Capital of Culture in 2016. Guests included EFA Director Marion Döring, executive producer Jürgen Biesinger, EFA Board Member Krzysztof Zanussi, the film composer Zbigniew Preisner, the director of the Polish Film Institute Agnieszka Odorowicz, and Roman Gutek, European Capital of Culture film curator.

The city of Wroclaw, home to Poland's biggest film festival, the T-Mobile New Horizons IFF (this year's 14th edition runs 24 July to 3 August), has a long film tradition with the Wroclaw Feature Film Studio, created in 1954. Legendary masterpieces of Polish cinematography were made here, such as Ashes and Diamonds by Andrzej Wajda, Polanski's debut Knife in the Water, Krzysztof Kieslowski's Scar, The Saragossa Manuscript by Wojciech J. Has, The Lonely Woman by Agnieszka Holland (now chairwoman of the EFA Board) and Andrzej Zulawski's On the Silver Globe.

"Wroclaw has always been a very important place for Polish cinema. While remembering about our heritage, we want to create a new image of Polish cinematography. We host the biggest film festival in Poland, we have the largest art house cinema in Europe, where not only we screen the most outstanding masterpieces of world cinema, but where we also educate and have discussions about films. Most of all, we have a very strong film community and remarkable audience, which is worth doing all we can to ensure that cinema still remains an important part of the city's cultural and social life" said Rafał Dutkiewicz, Mayor of Wroclaw.

To celebrate the announcement, New Horizons Cinema is screening a selection of EFA-awarded films.