Władysław Strzemiński (by Boguslav Linda), a Polish avant-garde painter, is fired from his job in Lodz Plastic Arts Academy and deprived of his membership in the artist union for his ideas that are contrary to the Stalinist art politics. Without any possibility to find a new job, he ends up by being not even allowed to buy any paint. With the help of his students and his daughter, who is overly mature for a child of her age, he is fighting for the right to create and to exist. This biopic about the life of a Polish artist and art theorist, marked by repression and fear, is an oeuvre of a staggering humanism and sensibility.
