The history of cinema in Poland is almost as long as the history of cinematography, and it has universally recognized achievements, even though Polish films tend to be less commercially available than films from several other European nations.
Krzysztof Eugeniusz Penderecki was a Polish composer and conductor. His best known works include Threnody to the Victims of Hiroshima, Symphony No. 3, his St Luke Passion, Polish Requiem, Anaklasis and Utrenja. Penderecki's oeuvre includes four operas, eight symphonies and other orchestral pieces, a variety of instrumental concertos, choral settings of mainly religious texts, as well as chamber and instrumental works.
Wacław Franciszek Sierpiński was a Polish mathematician. He was known for contributions to set theory, number theory, theory of functions, and topology. He published over 700 papers and 50 books.
Andrzej Witold Wajda was a Polish film and theatre director. Recipient of an Honorary Oscar, the Palme d'Or, as well as Honorary Golden Lion and Honorary Golden Bear Awards, he was a prominent member of the "Polish Film School". He was known especially for his trilogy of war films consisting of A Generation (1955), Kanał (1957) and Ashes and Diamonds (1958).
Kazimierz Kuratowski was a Polish mathematician and logician. He was one of the leading representatives of the Warsaw School of Mathematics.
Antoni Zygmund was a Polish mathematician. He worked mostly in the area of mathematical analysis, including especially harmonic analysis, and he is considered one of the greatest analysts of the 20th century. Zygmund was responsible for creating the Chicago school of mathematical analysis together with his doctoral student Alberto Calderón, for which he was awarded the National Medal of Science in 1986.
Janusz Zygmunt Kamiński is a Polish cinematographer and director of film and television. He has established a partnership with Steven Spielberg, working as a cinematographer on his films since 1993. He won the Academy Award for Best Cinematography for his work on Spielberg's holocaust drama Schindler's List and World War II epic Saving Private Ryan (1998). He has also received Academy Award nominations for Amistad (1997), The Diving Bell & the Butterfly (2007) War Horse (2011), Lincoln (2012), and West Side Story (2021). He has also received nominations for five BAFTA Awards, and six American Society of Cinematographers Awards.
Agnieszka Holland is a Polish film and television director and screenwriter, best known for her political contributions to Polish cinema. She began her career as assistant to directors Krzysztof Zanussi and Andrzej Wajda, and emigrated to France shortly before the 1981 imposition of the martial law in Poland.
Marta Magdalena Abakanowicz-Kosmowska was a Polish sculptor and fiber artist. She was known for her use of textiles as a sculptural medium and her outdoor installations. She is widely regarded as one of Poland's most internationally acclaimed artists. She was a professor at the Academy of Fine Arts in Poznań, Poland, from 1965 to 1990 and a visiting professor at University of California, Los Angeles in 1984.
The Polish Academy of Arts and Sciences or Polish Academy of Learning, headquartered in Kraków and founded in 1872, is one of two institutions in contemporary Poland having the nature of an academy of sciences.
Sarah Caroline Sinclair, known professionally as Olivia Colman, is an English actress. Known for her comedic and dramatic roles in film and television, she has received various accolades, including an Academy Award, a British Academy Film Award, two Emmy Awards, three British Academy Television Awards, and three Golden Globe Awards.
The Leon Schiller National Film School is a Polish academy for future actors, directors, photographers, camera operators and television staff. It was founded on 8 March 1948 in Łódź (Lodz).
The European Film Academy is an initiative of a group of European filmmakers who came together in Berlin on the occasion of the first presentation of the European Film Awards in November 1988.
The Primetime Emmy Awards, or Primetime Emmys, are part of the extensive range of Emmy Awards for artistic and technical merit for the American television industry. Bestowed by the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (ATAS), the Primetime Emmys are presented in recognition of excellence in American primetime television programming. The award categories are divided into three classes: the regular Primetime Emmy Awards, the Primetime Creative Arts Emmy Awards to honor technical and other similar behind-the-scenes achievements, and the Primetime Engineering Emmy Awards for recognizing significant contributions to the engineering and technological aspects of television. First given out in 1949, the award was originally referred to as simply the "Emmy Award" until the International Emmy Award and the Daytime Emmy Award were created in the early 1970s to expand the Emmy to other sectors of the television industry.
Krystyna Jolanta Janda is a Polish film and theater actress best known internationally for playing leading roles in several films by Polish director Andrzej Wajda, including Man of Marble and Man of Iron.
Abel Korzeniowski is a Polish composer of film and theatre scores.
Leonard Ian Abrahamson is an Irish film and television director. He is best known for directing independent films Adam & Paul (2004), Garage (2007), What Richard Did (2012), and Frank (2014), and Room (2015), all of which contributed to Abrahamson's six Irish Film and Television Awards.
Agata Kulesza is a Polish actress who has appeared on film, television, and stage. She has won four Polish Film Awards; three for her leading roles in the films Rose (2011), Ida (2013), and 25 lat niewinności. Sprawa Tomka Komendy (2020); and for her supporting role in I'm a Killer (2016).
Józef Razowski is a Polish entomologist and lepidopterist specializing in Tortricidae. He is an honorary member of the Polish Entomological Society and a working member of the Polish Academy of Arts and Sciences (PAU). From 1988 to 1997, Razowski headed the Institute of Systematics and Evolution of Animals.
Ryszard Lenczewski is a Polish film and television cinematographer with more than thirty feature film credits. Lenczewski has been the cinematographer for four of director Paweł Pawlikowski's feature films. His work on Pawlikowski's Ida (2014) has been widely recognized, garnering nominations for both the Academy Award and the BAFTA Award.