03/08/2026 - Marine Atlan's La Gradiva has scooped the Audience Award, while Helena Stańczyk's I'm Painting a Self-portrait, but All I See Is My Sister's Face triumphed in the Shortlist section

The 26th TAURON New Horizons International Film Festival, held in Wrocław from 23 July-2 August, has announced the winners of its main awards, with Aleksandre Koberidze's Dry Leaf taking home the Grand Prix and a €10,000 cash prize.

The international jury – comprising Ashley Clark, curatorial director at The Criterion Collection; Jessica Kiang, member of the Berlinale selection committee and critic for Variety; Caroline von Kühn, head of Oxbelly; Beatrice Loayza, of The New York Times and The Criterion Collection; and Maciej Nowicki, president of the Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights and co-founder of WATCH DOCS – awarded the festival's top honour to Dry Leaf, praising it as "a thrillingly audacious experiment" that "renews our faith" in cinema. The jury highlighted the movie's "banquet of cosmic, painterly images" and celebrated how "a film shot on an old, obsolete, tiny camera delivers new, vital, big-screen cinema". The Grand Prix is sponsored by Totalizator Sportowy, owner of the LOTTO brand.

The jury also handed a Special Mention to Once Upon a Time in Harlem by William and David Greaves. They described the documentary as "a one-of-a-kind work", commending it as both "a vital reclamation of a crucial period in American history", and "a beautifully intimate realisation of the communal and creative spirit that fuelled it", while celebrating its affectionate dialogue with figures whose legacies "cannot be allowed to be lost to time".

Festival audiences selected Marine Atlan's La Gradiva as the recipient of the Audience Award, accompanied by a €7,500 prize sponsored by the TAURON Group. The Cannes Critics' Week title follows a group of French secondary-school students on a school trip to Naples, blending coming-of-age drama with hauntological fantasy while exploring youthful desire, memory and inherited social structures.

In the Shortlist competition, Helena Stańczyk received the Zuzanna Jagoda Kolska Award for I'm Painting a Self-portrait, but All I See Is My Sister's Face. The jury praised the animated documentary as "a formally sophisticated and ingeniously crafted portrait" that creates "a creative dialogue between generations", while questioning whether complete symbiosis with another person ultimately gives more than it takes away. The prize, dedicated to filmmakers under the age of 30, includes PLN 8,000 (€1,850) funded by the Zuzanna Jagoda Kolska Foundation, the AMA Film Academy and the New Horizons Association, alongside a voucher from Dr Irena Eris and a specially designed crystal statuette.

Here is the complete list of winners at the 26th New Horizons International Film Festival:

Main Competition

Grand Prix
Dry Leaf – Aleksandre Koberidze (Germany/Georgia)
Special Mention
Once Upon a Time in Harlem – William Greaves, David Greaves (USA)

Audience Award
La Gradiva – Marine Atlan (France/Italy)

Shortlist Competition

Zuzanna Jagoda Kolska Award
I'm Painting a Self-portrait, but All I See Is My Sister's Face – Helena Stańczyk (Poland)