Master Class: Godfrey Reggio

30.05, 19.30 – 20.30 Kijów Studio (live online meeting)

free admission

According to Godfrey Reggio, art is the ability to provoke and ask questions. The borderline moment is near and we have an opportunity to find a way out. By means of sensations, emotions and perception, we need to find our own path in the thicket of messages and traces hinted by language, culture and civilization. A wealth of trigger lines and the focus on bullet points will bring back to us the ability to communicate and collaborate to understand all the meanings. The objective of this meeting is to ask questions, talk to each other and discover what we already know.

Partner: U.S. Consulate General in Krakow

Godfrey Reggio (born 1940 in New Orleans) is a pioneer of cinematic form, a creator of poetic images of extraordinary emotional impact. At the age of fourteen, he voluntarily joined the enclosed order of the Christian Brothers. He prayed, remained silent, fasted, and lived a life of asceticism for several years. In the 1960s, he co-founded La Clinica de la Gente, a medical and dental care centre for the poorest, and the Young Citizens for Action organization, where he volunteered on the streets of Santa Fe. Before turning thirty, he left the brotherhood and became interested in the nature of imagery and film. 

In 1972, he established the non-profit Institute for Regional Education and – two years later – the American Civil Liberties Union. He protested against media manipulation, social engineering, subliminal advertising, and privacy infringements. Reggio promoted environmental awareness and a return to lost spirituality. He believed that idealism is the most practical thing in life. 

During the production of educational short films, he met cinematographer Ron Fricke, and soon after, composer Philip Glass joined their duo. Together, they created the renowned Qatsi Trilogy and collaborated on Reggio’s subsequent films like Anima Mundi and Visitors.

Read the article by Marcin Borchardt “About the world out of balance”