“Art Center Zuzeum the team is honored and happy for the opportunity to host the friends, colleagues, talent admirers and documentary film enthusiasts of film director Laima Žurginas at the Laima jubilee film screening Zuzeum in the cozy living room. For five evenings, we will be waiting for everyone who wants to remember and appreciate or – on the contrary – get to know an essential part of Laima Žurginas’ rich cinema life. I greatly appreciate the director’s trust and confidence that Zuzeum is the right place to show Latvian cinema classics,” emphasizes the art center Zuzeum project manager Melissa Deborah Kashkur.
“Laima Žurgina – a director with an innate sense of culture and a cultivated style. Demanding. She has hardened herself in the rough corridors of the Riga Film Studio. She has not allowed herself to be ground among the genius but harsh old men who dominate there and has made her own cinema,” the documentaries state. Time bridges (2018) co-director Kristine Briede. In the sixties of the last century, young documentarians in Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia found a way to talk about their era in the conditions of Soviet censorship, while searching for answers to eternal questions, and at that time Laima Žurgina started working at the Riga Film Studio.
Time bridge producer Uldis Cekulis: “Laima is a real cinema professional with a cultivated style in everything, strong vitality, at the same time demanding of herself and others! One can only admire her phenomenal memory, in which the film scenes flash up to the smallest detail, moreover – in a healthy, self-deprecating reflection .”
Laima Jurgin’s anniversary program Five days in September will open on September 20 at 19.00 with a full-length documentary 235 000 000, directed by Uldis Brauns, directors – Laima Žurgina and Biruta Veldre, screenplay author – Hercs Franks, cinematographers Ralfs Krūmiņš, Valdis Krogis, Rihards Pīks, Uldis Brauns and composer Raimonds Pauls. The masterpiece of Riga’s poetic documentary cinema is recorded in the history of world cinema, but it was created as a paradox – the “anniversary” film conceived by the authorities turned into a universal and philosophical poem about the main intersections of the everyday person’s life path: first steps, first day of school, first love, wedding , the continuation of the family… The authors filmed from the Baltic Sea to Kamchatka, looking for the nationally peculiar and different in Georgia, Latvia, Kyrgyzstan, Siberia and the small nations of the Far East.
on September 21 at At 19.00, the portrait films that the director has combined in the program will be shown Familiar faces. The format allocated to each film – 10 or 20 minutes – made us search for a concentrated and content-filled form in order to say the essentials. The film characters of this program are Ojārs Vācietis (film the fourth dimension, 1977), Imants Ziedonis (Imants Ziedonis. Portrait in folds, 1979), Gemma Skulme (Gemma, 1986) and Raymond Paul (Raymond Paul. Portrait with music, 1977), as well as Andris Grīnbergs. In the movie The ugly duckling-human child (1985) until then, the well-known fashion artist in the youth community and the king of Riga’s hippies works at the Mazirbe boarding school as a teacher and dedicates his creative spirit to children and young people, whom the society – officials, educators, parents – have pushed “far from the eyes” and determined that their lives after elementary schools will determine the shovel or broom. The film has aroused international interest and won awards at film festivals, discussed in forums of pedagogues and psychologists.
On the evening of September 22, two films will be screened, which L. Žurgina has combined under the title Political sidestep – They are also my sons (1990) and 1988 summer chronicle (1988). 20th century in the mid-1980s, initiated by Mikhail Gorbachev family strike a belief emerged that the long period of hypocrisy had come to an end. During this period, the movement of soldiers’ mothers spread, protesting against the epidemic of illegal relationships widespread in the Soviet army, or ģedovščina, because many young people conscripted into compulsory military service during peacetime died in unclear circumstances. The film was shot both in Latvia and in other Soviet regions, and even then many victims were from Ukraine. They are also my sons gained wide resonance – it was awarded at international film festivals (Cannes, Lübeck, Mannheim, Yekaterinburg, Oberhausen, Kogoshima, etc.) and was shown on TV channels SAT3, ZDF, YLE1, RTV1, etc. 1988 summer chronicle is a film magazine format and unites the beginning events of the Third Awakening in Latvia: the legendary Radošo Savienību 1.-2. June plenum, events at the Freedom Monument, rock opera Bear predator dress rehearsal in Burtnieki, etc. Author of behind-the-scenes text – Dainis İvāns.
on September 23 at A movie will be shown at 19.00 My beloved Riga (2003), in which the authors wanted to leave a testimony to future generations about what the capital of Latvia and its people were like in a very important time – when not only hundreds of years changed, but thousands! Each short story that creates a portrait of Riga preserves the testimony of a person from Riga about his field: Art Nouveau expert, architect Jānis Krastiņš and the most titled athlete of all time Jānis Lūsis, architect of Riga Airport Andris Kronbergs and world-famous violin virtuoso Gidons Krēmers with a chamber orchestra Kremerata Baltica and many others. Tērbatas street celebration, opening of the Rumbula memorial and Orthodox Easter, hockey fans and Song Festival with the participation of Vairas Vīke-Freibergas and composers Mārtiņa Braun and Uldi Stabulnieka.
On the other hand, on Laima Žurgina’s birthday – September 24 – at At 3:30 p.m., a portrait-film of the generation will be shown The goat climbed into the sky (2019), which can be considered the director’s autobiography, because it is “a story about the time we had to live in and the time we don’t choose”. It was a time when the Iron Curtain was down between the Western and Eastern worlds, when young people were denied the opportunity to travel freely, limited to receive information from the wider world, express themselves in a way that differed from the official ideology. However, it is a paradox that precisely these restrictions encouraged the gathering of free-thinking “wrong” Soviet youth in the small cafe in Old Riga with the informal name Chicken, find your creative path and take a permanent place in Latvian culture. There are many such personalities: Imants Lancmanis and Imants Kalniņš, Maija Tabaka and Biruta Delle, Māra Ķimele and Māra Brašmane, Modris Tenisons and Laima Eglīte, Jānis Rokpelnis and Uldis Bērziņš, Juris Zvirgzdiņš and Augustīns Delle, Eižens Valpēteris and Mudīte Gaiševska… “You won’t name them all ,” says L. Jurgina.
“Laima Žurgina’s films and film magazines show the special perspective of the director in the perception of artists and the art environment, which is very close to her. By choosing not to follow demand, actuality, but to choose her own path and topics close to her – this is the director Laima Žurgina, whose work’s various facets will be possible evaluate in this program,” describes Zane Balčus.
L. Žurgina’s anniversary program will show restored versions of films procured by the Latvian National Archives in their original quality, many (Fourth dimension, Imants Ziedonis. Portrait in folds, Gemma, Raimons Pauls. Portrait with music, Ugly duckling-man’s child, 1988 summer chronicle, My dear Riga, The goat climbed into the sky) – with English subtitles.
Entrance ticket price – 8 euros, half price for students and pensioners – 4 euros. Tickets for each screening can be purchased in advance zuzeum.com and at the art center box office, seats are limited.
The film program for Laima Jurgin’s anniversary is made by the studio VFS Films and an art center Zuzeum with the State Cultural Capital Fund, Valmiermuižas and the support of the National Archives of Latvia.
2023-09-18 14:01:48
#Zuzeum #host #Laima #Jurgins #jubilee #film #screening
