One more time in Wroclaw

I arrived in Wroclaw on the 26-th of September. The city was an absolute gentlemen. Kind, intelligent and charming. The light was soft, the colours around were fascinating. Autumn was all over. There was hope in the air. New place, new streets, new people, new conversations. New thoughts, hopefully. However, the same old me. 

It didn’t took me long to find my favourite places: my dearest bench, park, café, bridge, my own paths, my route, my tree, my painting in the gallery, my table in the bar, my darling bartender, my favoured beer (Ksiazece dark).

I went to a delightful concert in the National Forum of music. It was a concert of “The real group” – professional a cappella group from Sweden and they were great.

I also went on a trip to a Krakow and, of course, enjoyed it very much but I was surprised to find out how happy I was to come back in Wroclaw. As if I was coming back home.

I visited the Botanical garden a couple of times and I am sure that this is the place where I can find peace and harmony.

I danced, I laugh, I remember wandering around Rynek, eating ice-cream and thinking that I am feeling good. And that doesn’t happen very often, does it?

But the most important event happened to me on the 12-th of October. At “Kino Nowe Horyzonty“ was shown Andrew Dominik’s movie – “One more time with feeling” as a part of the „Avant film festival“.

Let’s start from the beginning. Nick Cave is an Australian musician, singer, songwriter, poet, writer and screenwriter.  He is widely recognized for his work with his band “The bad seeds” and with the song “Where the wild roses grow”, which he performs with Kylie Minogue (the song is written by him). Above all, he is a genius. True artist with  vivid imagination. I am one of his greatest fans.

Last year he lost his son Arthur. The 15-th year old boy stumbled off a cliff into the Ovingdean Gap near Brighton on July 14. Arthur was disorientated after a bad LSD trip. In a final message to his friend he asks: “Where am I? Where am I?” Arhur has a twin brother Earl.

“One more time with feeling” is a movie, produced by Nick Cave. It follows the making of the album “Skeleton Tree”. The album was released after Arthur’s death. If you don’t know what’s behind, you can’t understand the movie. Everybody are paralysed, wandering around. Nobody mentions Arthur till the first hour. Nick Cave was feeling trapped and needed somehow to move on. That’s why he decided to make the movie. Cave says that he and his wife, the famous model Susie Brick, were forced to grieve in public and that, in a way, saved them. “People often say they can’t imagine how it would feel to lose a child, but, actually, they can – they can imagine what it is like…Like there’s just this thing, and there’s no way to navigate it. It just sits there and it fills up all the space. It fills up your body. It’s like a physical thing. You can feel it pressing against the insides of your fingers. There’s just no room for the luxury of creation.”

 

Before I came to Poland I was feeling very sad. And, inexplicably, the only thing that could respond to my sadness was the album “Skeleton tree” and the movie “One more time with feeling”. You know that your own sadness is the greatest, the worst you can imagine. This movie wasn’t shown like a regular movie, only a few times in different cities around the world. That’s the reason why I was so shocked that it was going to be presented one more time in Wroclaw.

I know all the songs performed in the movie – every minute, pause, breathe. I know Nick Cave’s  poem “Steve Mcqueen” by heart. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uWjZ85m1BKg

“One more time with feeling” is a devastating experience. Weeks and months after you have watched it, the movie is haunting you. And “Skeleton tree”, „Girl in amber“, „I need you“, „Magneto“, „Distant sky“. These pieces of music belong to other, unknown worlds.

We all have traumatic experiences in our lives. Things that have changed us. Suddenly you are not the same person anymore. We are often afraid, lonely and lost. We are wandering around new cities, hoping to become better versions of ourselves. And I believe that there are signs that „highly recommend“ us never, never, never, never, never to give up.“Because someone’s gotta sing the stars. And someone’s gotta sing the rain. And someone’s gotta sing the blood.

And someone’s gotta sing the pain.“