Kuba Dorabialski

Shot as a series of stunning vignettes across three countries, Polish-Australian artist Kuba Dorabialski’s extraordinary film conjures the mystique and mysticism of the former Soviet Union. A champion ski jumper collides with ball lightning. Witches conduct wartime sabotage. Ecstatic dance resurrects a revolutionary leader. While party apparatchiks promoted socialism as a technologically advanced, ‘scientific’ project, Dorabialski uncovers a world in thrall to everyday magic and miracles. Narrated in a fictional pan-Slavic language with absurdist flair, Connections of the Sticks transports us to the Eastern Bloc as it lives on in retro-futurist fantasies, diasporic nostalgia and half-remembered family legends.

Agata travels from Sydney to Sarajevo to write a war novel, but as she gathers material, she is challenged by locals who question her motives. Her creative uncertainty growing, she sees a startling mystery unfold: some provocative and obscene artworks inexplicably vanish. As Agata reads the first chapters of her new novel, it becomes clear that the story is not about the war itself, but about the quiet, very human moments of resilience that persist in its shadow. During her stay in Sarajevo, Agata has developed a deeper understanding of the act of storytelling and the profound responsibilities that come with being a storyteller.