Professor Barbara Giza, lecturer, researcher, and Head of the Department of Journalism and Communication, at SWPS University, has been appointed to the jury of the 18th International Film Festival “Signs of the Night”, which is centered in Urbino, Italy this year, however due to the pandemic situation film screenings and other activities are taking place online.
The mandate of the Festival is to highlight complex political, social, psychological, philosophical, and technological problems of contemporary societies and to promote cross-cultural tolerance.
"Signs of the Night" is an international indie festival of documentary and audiovisual art. The program includes productions that reflect a new and original view and a critical approach to key issues of contemporary existence. This is a place for films daring to cross the boundaries, surprising, “different”, potentially free of the pressure exerted by tradition, ready to jump head first into unpredictable experimentation.
The Festival was established in 2003. Since then, the Festival has presented close to a thousand films from 70 countries, during the annual festival screenings. Additionally, the films participated in close to 140 programs, organized in collaboration with cultural institutions and festivals in 33 countries, including Algeria, Australia, Chile, Cuba, Hungary, Indonesia, Japan, Lebanon, Lithuania, Peru, Russia, Slovenia, Tunisia, Turkey, and the United States.
In 2013 the festival became a bi-national event, and it also takes place in Berlin and Saarbrücken, in Germany. As of 2015 the Festival went international and has been organized in Bangkok (Thailand), Lisbon (Portugal), Tucumán (Argentina), and Urbino (Italy).
More information about the Festival »
Professor Barbara Giza – is the Head of the Department of Journalism and Communication at SWPS University. Her area of expertise comprises history and theory of film as well as journalism and mass media. Her research focuses on the role of film in the contemporary audiovisual culture and aspects of screen adaptations of literature, such as copyright and screenwriting. Her other research interests include the history of Polish film, film theory, history and theory of screenwriting, film criticism, film journalism, socio-political aspects of film, autobiographical elements in film, and Polish writers and filmmakers in the era of Communism. Professor Giza is also a researcher at the National Film Archive – Audiovisual Institute in Warsaw, specializing in film and film culture. She is a co-researcher in a social research project “Poles about Polish films”, financed by the Polish Film Institute (PISF). She is a member of the International Federation of Film Critics FIPRESCI, a board member of the Polish Society for Film and Media Studies, and a member of the editorial board of Pleograf, a quarterly magazine published by the Polish Film Academy. More information »