Creative Polish directing duo Kijiek/Adamski caught our eye when they were named Antville’s best unsigned directors of 2010. And we can see why – whether it’s the playful cut and paste of their Oi Va Voy video, their abstract Gran Central promo which literally asks ‘how long is a piece of string?’ or their nostalgic Brodka video about the dispappearance of a legendary Warsaw haunt. Intrigued we tracked the duo (Katarzyna Kijek and Przemysław Adamski) to find out more…
Where did the pair of you meet and why did you decide to work together?
We met years back in high school. We were doing various graphic related stuff individually but since we focused on moving image it became clear for us that working together is much more effective – especially as we are dealing with animation a lot.
I love the abstract, experimental feel of your Grand Central music video – it’s both spontaneous and also quite mesmerising. How did you go about developing that video?
Actually it was the one and only case when we dedicated so much time to experimenting and finding the right way to accomplish a satisfying effect.
At the beginning we intended to make a one-shot video documenting a huge structure made of yarn. Unfortunately we weren’t able to hire an interior with the right space, so we had to revise the script taking the edit into consideration. Later on – as we started to work with the thread we were constantly discovering the material’s capabilities. At the same time we were simplifying compositions until they reached their limit of abstraction. Actually it became possible to create suggestive images with the simpliest means when we combined peculiar ways of illuminating the yarn with the proper movement and very long exposures.
In the meantime we dropped a few ways of developing this project leaving behind the “daylight version”, part of which you can see here:
https://vimeo.com/12657110
The Brodka video “W pięciu smakach” has a very poignant story behind it. I love how Brodka’s costume evolves using key elements from the market. What sort of personal significance did the video have for you?
We have pretty much explained the basic idea of this video under the post on our blog (http://kijekadamski.blogspot.com/2010/10/brodka-w-pieciu-smakach.html).
The whole concept of the video is based on places that have disappeared from the map of Warsaw to make way for new buildings.
The so called “Fair Europe” was a huge market filled with hundreds of stalls selling mostly cheap clothing. This area was also famous for tiny bars dishing up Vietnamese cuisine (since there was large population of Vietnamese immigrants working at the market).
Brodka’s song is about a peculiar custom that was alive until the very last days of the market’s existence. People frequented Vietnamese bars hidden in the labyrinth of lanes to finish all night partying with the famous pho soup.
All the materials incorporated into Brodka’s costume (trainers, textiles, chopsticks, bags, etc) were essentials for the market scenery.
The whole video was shot in one night
Nevertheless shortly after the video was published we heared dozens of interpretations and we found some of them quite accurate or at least intriguing.
First of all some people found this video to be a strong vote against consumerism and the inundation of shoddy articles. It never was our primary intention to make a video about global problems but this point of view makes sense to us.
Other interpretations are more local and concern Brodka herself. Since Monika Brodka achieved her success at a very young age the music industry was trying to make her something she wasn’t, to promote a certain type of a pop star. Now she has changed her career path and distanced herself from her early works. The music video finale was interpreted as destroying her earlier manipulated image.
At the beginning it was important to invent the right system of capturing, printing, shredding and recpturing all the images. Later on it was rather easy to follow this path. The real difficulty then was dealing with the backache.
Where next for you?
We have just finished a short film and we are about to complete our next music video.
We still have dozens ideas we are eager to realise – just waiting for the right opportunities.
