About

Spektrum is an international film festival that for 12 years has been a meeting space for people celebrating feature-length and short cinema. Drawing from the cross-border identity of Lower Silesia, the festival combines auteur cinema with local hospitality.
The 12th edition of Spektrum will take place on October 20–25, 2026, in Świdnica.

Idea

Plakat 12. edycji Festiwalu Filmowego Spektrum. W centralnej części widzimy całującą się parę, stojącą na wzgórzu z widokiem na Pałac Schönbrunn w Wiedniu i jego błonia. Na plakacie znajdują się czerwone napisy: w górze - Spektrum Film Festival, pośrodku hasło edycji - Staging the truth, na dole - 20-25.10.2026. Świdnica

Nothing in cinema happens by accident. Someone chooses where to place the camera, decides how the light falls, writes every line of dialogue, and determines the exact moment when two characters will meet. Yet it is within this carefully staged reality that we so often encounter something profoundly true.

This year’s Spektrum Film Festival theme is STAGING THE TRUTH.

The phrase can be understood in many ways. It may suggest performing truth, constructing it, rehearsing it, or constantly questioning it. Truth is rarely fixed or absolute. More often, it emerges from multiple perspectives, lived experiences, and interpretations.

Everyone sitting in a cinema watches the same film, yet each person leaves with a different story. We all bring our own experiences into the screening, and those experiences shape the way we see, understand, and interpret the world. Cinema does not offer definitive answers — it invites conversation.

STAGING THE TRUTH is an invitation to ask questions, to embrace uncertainty, and to accept that truth is seldom singular.

Take a look at the photograph featured in this year’s festival visual identity.

At first glance, we see a couple in love. Perhaps they are taking their usual walk through a neighbourhood they know by heart.

Perhaps this is their final meeting before saying goodbye forever. Or perhaps they are simply posing for the camera, playing the roles we instinctively assign to them.

The real story behind the photograph, however, is quite different.

A Finnish photographer was visiting Vienna when he happened to capture the couple in the frame. He later shared the image on social media, and some time afterwards the people in the photograph got in touch to thank him for preserving such an important moment in their lives. Today they are married, and the photograph shows the very first trip they ever took together.

But the story doesn’t end there.

When we decided to use the photograph as part of Spektrum’s visual identity, we contacted them once again. That’s when they revealed one more detail: they had actually met in Poland while taking part in a student exchange programme.

Reality had once again written a better screenplay than we could have imagined.

It is precisely this space — between staging and truth — that we want to explore together this year.

At this year’s Spektrum Film Festival, you’ll discover many more stories that resist simple interpretations.

Join us, and see them with us.

Previous editions

Spektrum is, above all, a brilliant interpersonal experience – I have never met so many friendly and open-minded people anywhere. Spektrum is a festival without pathos, created by people who love what they do, and this energy is transferred to the event.

Miłosz Sakowski

Take a few people with open heads, with imaginations exceeding the norms […] And take a city with a metaphysical soul. […] With wise and modern authorities. Take a cinema room, projector and movies. Now mix it all together, add heartiness, hospitality and lack of haughtiness. Here is a fulfilled recipe for Spektrum, Świdnica Film Festival. I know because I was a guest there.

Jan Jakub Kolski

Great program and honest audience. An intimate festival at its best!

Agnieszka Woszczyńska

Spektrum is primarily people who love cinema. I felt at home during the festival. Very good organization, very good movies and a picturesque city. It is worth being there, it is worth spending the extended November weekend at Spektrum.

Grażyna Błęcka-Kolska

Świdnica

Świdnica is a city whose attractions exceed its scale, and with a pleasant and intimate atmosphere, it is able to give a relief to anyone who suffered from fatigue with the big city rush.

Świdnica, located only 50 km from Wrocław, stands out from similar cities with a rich offer of cultural events, but also historic architecture, a bustling Market Square and close proximity to picturesque touristic sites. It is an ideal place to spend free time, as well as a brilliant stopping point on the travel route.

Tourists from all over the world, visiting Lower Silesia, always go to the 17th-century Church of Peace, which is the seat of the Evangelical-Augsburg parish, but also – thanks to the efforts of Bożena Pytel and Fr. Bishop Waldemar Pytel – a cultural center. In 2001 the building was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List, and its spaces are where meetings, discussions and unforgettable concerts are held, with the Bach Festival at the forefront.