Michał Merczyński

Polish culture expert, cultural animator, manager of cultural institutions and festivals.

"Manager of culture", European Union expert in culture, long-term director of various institutions, among others: Malta International Theatre Festival, Variety Theatre in Warsaw, Polish Film Institute.

In 1985 he graduated from Cultural Studies at Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznan. He also obtained a European Diploma in Cultural Art Management.

In 1984-1989 he worked as a manager of the Orchestra of the Eighth Day (Jan Kaczmarek, Grzegorz Banaszak, Maciej Talaga). In 1991 he initiated the MALTA International Theater Festival (renamed Malta Festival Poznań in 2009), taking the position of its director. Malta Festival Poznań as the only one from Poland and one of twelve in Europe received an EFFE Award for trend-setting events. The jury recognized Malta Festival Poznań as the most innovative festival in Poland: at first presenting theater, and for the last five years inviting leading artists to curate programs around selected themes and ideas. - said Vincent Baudriller, head of the international jury, director of Theatre Vidy in Lausanne and former director of Festival d'Avignon, while presenting the award in Paris to Michał Merczyński, director of the Malta Festival Poznań. In 2007 Michał Merczyński inaugurated the Nostalgia Music Festival, organized by the Malta Foundation. From 1996 to 1997, he was program director at TVP Poznań.

Michał Merczyński was director of the office of the Henryk Wieniawski Musical Society in Poznań (1997-2002), managed the Variety Theatre in Warsaw (2002-2005), the Dialogue of Four Cultures Festival (2003-2005), and the Polish Film Institute (2005). From 2005 to 2017 he headed the Polish Audiovisual Publishers, transformed in 2009 into the National Audiovisual Institute. Michał Merczyński successfully guided it through the meanders of digitization of cultural heritage and shaped Polish culture in theory - through the Institute's online magazine Dwutygodnik published by the Institute, as well as in practice - by supporting hundreds of cultural events. In 2011. NInA was co-responsible for the organization of the European Culture Congress and the National Cultural Programme of the Presidency. and opened the Institute's new headquarters in May 2015.

He was among the experts of the Culture Programme 2007-2013 run by the European Commission, developed the Polish artistic presentation at Expo 2000 in Hanover. He coordinated the National Cultural Programme of the Polish Presidency of the Council of the European Union. In 2002, together with Lech Raczak, he was awarded a diploma "Creator of Culture" by Polityka weekly. In 2013 awarded the Knight's Cross of the Order of Polonia Restituta.