A show and tell about a certain structural invention, the chain score, which enables the sharing of the creative process, material, and/or time with other artists. Jozef Robakowski took the idea of the chain score from Katarzyna Kobro’s concept of the 1930s and applied it in the 1970s as a way of making a multi-author film statement. Robakowski’s first ‘chain’ film is titled ’22x’ and was made in 1971, by 22 students who were each given 20 meters of film stock by the artist. The individuals made their works on the sections of tape they received, which were then collected and glued together to form a single film. The idea of a chain score appears in Robakowski’s subsequent experiments, including the famous Living Gallery (1975) and Construction in Process (1981-82), while its contemporary manifestations are also identified by the artist in the current work of many artists, including that developing in social media.

Józef Robakowski is one of the most important representatives of the neo-avant-garde, author of films, photographs, video recordings, installations, broadcasts, drawings, objects, interventions and performances, texts and manifestos, publications; initiator of exhibitions and multi-media artistic events. He understands art above all as the release of energy, exploring and revealing its bio-mechanical elements.

Born in 1939 in Poznań, he studied art history and museology at the Faculty of Fine Arts of the Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń and at the Faculty of Cinematography of the Polish National Film, Television and Theatre School in Łódź. Lecturer, then a professor at the PWSFTViT in Łódź. Co-founder of artistic groups, the most important of which are ZERO-61 (1961-69) and WFF – Film Form Workshop (1970-77).

Active participant of ZRZUTY CULTURE, underground artistic life during martial law, co-founder of Infermental. His works are in the most important public and private collections at home and abroad. The video works that the artist donated to the WRO Art Center were published in a comprehensive monograph entitled Józef Robakowski: Energetic Images and Biomechanical Records.