On Wednesday, November 3, in Warsaw, the first edition of the International Television Festival Heart of Europe, organized by Polish Television, was opened. The Festival which sees 12 public broadcasters from Central and Eastern Europe participating was inaugurated at a press briefing with the participation of Jacek Kurski, President of TVP, and Mateusz Matyszkowicz, Member of the Management Board.

From November 3 to 5, attendees of the screenings can watch the festival offers at Kinoteka free of charge, and throughout the month - until November 30, most of the TV productions will be available on the heartofeurope.tvp.pl video platform.


The aim of the festival is to strengthen the community of inhabitants of this part of Europe, stimulate the exchange of ideas, exchange of content, or animate cooperation at the level of artists from the region. Polish Television, which is the organizer of the festival, intends to develop this project so that it becomes a permanent event in the calendar of creators of the Central and Eastern Europe region and becomes a reference point for viewers, not only in Poland but also abroad.

Broadcasters from the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Lithuania, Estonia, Ukraine, Georgia, Bulgaria, Romania, Croatia and Serbia applied for the festival, who submitted a total of almost 90 productions in six competition categories: feature film, series, documentary, entertainment, broadcasts for children and teenagers, as well as digital projects going beyond traditional television.

Telewizja Polska submitted its proposals in all categories.

There is a separate jury for each category. The compositions of individual jurors were created based on the applications of the broadcasters participating in the event. They are experts in the field: creative directors, program directors, producers and creators.

The Heart of Europe festival will end on November 5 with the Awards Gala, which will be broadcast at 18.30 on TVP Kultura and on the website heartofeurope.tvp.pl.


In addition to the screenings at the Warsaw Kinoteka, on November 3 and 4, there will be two online panels with the participation of representatives of public media broadcasters. The first was devoted to the development and challenges facing the public media in the context of threats posed by the growing competition of digital platforms. It was attended by: Stanislav Kimchev CEETV, Hicran Lefort - Sales Director CIS, Oceania, CEE and the Baltics, MIP Markets and Toomas Luhats - Director of Content Acquisition and VOD at Estonian public broadcaster ERR.

The second one will concern the identity of Central and Eastern Europe in the productions of broadcasters participating in the Festival. The discussion will be between: Jan Maxa - content and new media director, Czech Television, Marko Novaković - film and TV director, editor responsible for series, RTS and producer Piotr Kornobis.