Introduction to “Traces” – a film by Victoria Sara Davis

Until the end of 2023, the Masovian Museum in Płock will host the exhibition “In praise of serendipity”, carried out as part of the “Stories” project and inspired by the works of Franciszka and Stefan Themerson. One of the works presented at the exhibition is “Traces” by Victoria Sara Davis – a six-screen circle of projections inspired by found fragments of the 13-year-old documentary “Themerson&Themerson”.

Below we present an introduction to “Traces”, Victoria’s film from 2010, which is part of the series, although it is not presented at the exhibition. In the film you will find, among others: scenes from outside the London house of Franciszka and Stefan, Małgorzata Sady – a long-time friend of the Themersons (and curator of “Praise”), the drawing “Is it the world upside down or am I” and the painting “Loneliness” by Franciszka, a semantic telegram sent by Stefan to his wife in the 1950s . 20th century, a storyboard of the unrealized film “Paris” by artists, glasses, a machine and a photo of Stefan Themerson, Victoria – the author of the film – entering the then Themerson archive and Nick Wadley reading Stefan’s text against the background of the visual representation of this haiku.