Matuszni Family Archive

Antoni Matuszny, who came from the Beskid village of Laliki, was interested in photography since he was a child. As he recalls, he wanted to save the life of his family and the countryside in the 1970s from oblivion. At the age of thirteen, he bought the first camera, and when he was 24 – the camera of the Soviet Quarz 5.

A film made during the Christmas holidays of 1979 in Cięcina. Elżbieta Matuszna places a platter of apples on the table and shares the wafer with her husband Antoni. As the filmmaker recalls, this was their first Christmas together after their marriage in August of the same year. Shots of the Christmas tree and festive decorations in the room. The Matusznys are joined by other family members – Elżbieta and Franciszek Wojciuch (Elżbieta Matuszna’s parents), Elżbieta Wojciuch’s mother Maria, Elżbieta’s aunt Rozalia with her daughter Krystyna, sister Franciszka with her husband Stanisław Juraszek, Elżbieta Wojciuch’s sister with her husband Jan Krauz, and uncle Karol Pawlik. Shots of disguisers accosting people walking to church. On New Year’s Eve, the Matusznys are visited by Elżbieta’s sister Jadwiga Wojciuch and neighbors and distant relatives, Teresa and Stanisław Skrzypek. Antoni opens the champagne. A shot of a greeting card. 

(KN, AT)