Films in this screening:

Michael Frei:

Kids

Switzerland, 2019. 9 minutes.

An animated short exploring group dynamics. How do we define ourselves when we are all equal?

Total Refusal:

Hardly Working

Austria, 2022. 20 minutes.

Hardly Working sheds a limelight on the very characters that normally remain in the background of video games: NPCs. They are non-player characters that populate the digital world as extras to create the appearance of normality. A laundress, a stable boy, a street sweeper and a carpenter are observed with ethnographic precision. They are Sisyphus machines, whose labour routines, activity patterns as well as bugs and malfunctions paint a vivid analogy for work under capitalism.

Nikita Diakur:

Ugly

Germany, 2022. 21 minutes.

An ugly cat struggles to make friends in an evil neighbourhood, but finds a soulmate in a Native American chief who helps it on its journey to restore balance within the world.

Atsushi Wada:

My Exercise

Japan, 2020. 3 minutes.

A boy is doing exercises with his dog.

Pablo Ballarín:

In My Chest of Fire There Is Still Place to Temple Your Dagger

Spain, 2021. 24 minutes.

This is the story of a fighter and a trainer, and the strange relationship that they have.

Content warnings for this screening
Scene warning: animal abuse, gun violence

Films in this screening:

Rufus Dye-Montefiore, Luke Dye-Montefiore:

Babe of the Moon

United Kingdom, 2023. 3 minutes.

A sunflower falls in love with the moon. They share one night together.

Chihiro Sato, Takaaki Numa, E:

Glitter Electron

Japan, 2022. 6 minutes.

A music video for composer E’s song “Glitter electron”, an animation work created by Chihiro Sato, Takaaki Numa and E. This film is a glitter storm of pleasant and strange visual images and electronic sounds on the theme of electricity, which is the driving force of modern civilization. Based on the music produced by E, Chihiro and Takaaki individually created fragmentary short episodes with various electronic motifs.

Aga Jarząb, Maciek Bączyk:

Zen for TV

Poland, 2022. 6 minutes.

Ambient piece ZEN for TV is a nostalgic reminiscence of the times when a TV broadcast could end for the day before our eyes. TV used to finish the transmission a few minutes after midnight. Then the screen turned black and white, filled with noise. With a little bit of imagination, in that noise one could see stone zen gardens, patiently raked by a silent monk. Gazing at the end of the TV programme was some sort of electronic meditation of the late 80s. The animated music video helps to grasp the concept of it.

Guido Devadder, Kaitlin McSweeney:

Hungry Ghost

Belgium, 2022. 7 minutes.

The feelings of both loss and desire are among the first and strongest emotions we experience as human beings. Desire is what keeps us alive, propagates us, but also destroys us. ‘Hungry Ghost’ is a poetic journey into the hazy netherworld of human craving, visualised through looping zoetrope animations.

Chiara Mazzoni, Daniel Damm:

A humble lying song

Sweden, 2023. 3 minutes.

The film tells a story of a lying spider, a deceiving and mysterious musician who meets a fly and decides to seduce her, only to have her killed by the end of their passionate night together.

Piotr Kaźmierczak:

Water Lullaby

Poland, 2022. 4 minutes.

Stop motion, animated with sand, official video clip to “Water Lullaby” song from the “Waterduction” album by a famous Polish folk music band “Warsaw Village Band”. The production of the film took 6 months.

Sijia Luo:

Be Gone

China, 2022. 4 minutes.

Music animation for the song “Be Gone” by electronicore band KNIVESRAIN. By exploring the possibilities of combining AI-generated content with hand-drawn 2D animation, it tells a story of a mobile phone that experiences the plight of modern people in a serendipitous epiphany, learning what it means to be human between life and death.

Soetkin Verstegen:

Beautiful Figures

Belgium, 2022. 4 minutes.

Thoughts ripple over the pages of a personal notebook, kept during a stay at different science labs in Zürich. They float from one to another, like a mind map of unfinished ideas on memory, medical imaging, cells, and aging.

marco Imov:

The Chats - 6L GTR

Denmark, 2022. 2 minutes.

Official music for the Chats’s song “6L GTR”. The boys are driving their old van recklessly, but all they really want is to drive a 6L GTR.

Polina Chuykova:

Ocean
(Океан)

Russian Federation, 2022. 4 minutes.

An ocean of events and emotions, reconsideration of the past, acceptance, anger, confusion and gratitude… «Ocean» is the official music video of the band «Mind Cry», created for a minor composition. The abstract visual content shows a number of plots on a common theme and opens a gallery of symbolic images. In the clip there is an implication to the feelings and emotions of a person who is tormented by suffering and emotional upheaval. The character hides them under a mask of stillness, but then explodes like a raging ocean.

Iulia Voitova:

Monsters

France, 2022. 4 minutes.

Coline Rio – Monsters (official video). The heroine and her alter ego travel through her emotions.

Karina Torres:

Do Good And Bad Will Come To You

Costa Rica, 2022. 2 minutes.

This is the official music video for Gab Albertozzi’s “Do Good And Bad Will Come To You” from the album “Odious Melodious” out now, on all streaming platforms.

Irina Rubina:

Miles Davis - What’s Love Got to Do With It

United States, 2022. 4 minutes.

Star People strolling through the night. Each of them alone, in their own dance, accompanied by shiny flowing waves. Those small sparkling dashes can lead them out of the darkness into surrealistic, mysterious and cheerful scenery, if everything goes right…

Juho Maurinen, Santeri Laasanen:

MUSCLE HEARTS

Finland, 2022. 5 minutes.

Planet Muscleion and it’s beefcake inhabitants are in danger because of a threat from outer space, but the real threat is much closer: low self-esteem of a beloved friend.

Films in this screening:

Todd Allan Stewart:

The Wind and the Trees

Canada, 2022. 8 minutes.

Deep in the boreal forest, a mature pine tree and a seedling begin a conversation. As the years pass, they observe the ever-present wind and the many ways it affects them. A quiet story about the circle of life. Adapted from the Governor General’s Award nominated children’s book of the same name.

Sofia El Khyari:

Shadow of the Butterflies
(L’Ombre des papillons)

France, 2022. 9 minutes.

In a mysterious forest, a woman is slowly lured into a nostalgic daydream as she observes butterflies.

Leonor Pacheco:

Deep breath
(Alento)

Portugal, 2022. 4 minutes.

During the late hours of the night a form tries to fall asleep. Struggling to maintain control, it gets trapped into vicious cycles of abstract madness, visually and audibly growing into a visceral and bizarre conflict between compression and decompression.

Olivér Hegyi:

The Garden of Heart
(A szív kertje)

Hungary, 2022. 11 minutes.

Dániel Juhász, a young aspiring painter with low self-esteem, is in his last round of interviews at the painting department of the Academy of Fine Arts. While waiting for his interview, his demons appear to him in the form of garden pests.

Keila Cepeda:

Chimborazo

Spain, 2022. 7 minutes.

Chimborazo’s ice pickers have long been subjected for years to the inclemency of the volcano, located in the Ecuadorian Andes. In exchange, they crush some of its ice to provide for their people. Nowadays, it would be an occupation on the verge of extinction if it wasn’t for Baltazar Ushca, who despite of his age, walks to the Chimborazo glacier every day for hours to get large blocks of ice which he later sells in the nearest city.

Asparuh Petrov:

Trace
(Sleda)

Bulgaria, 2022. 7 minutes.

А young writer dedicates his nights to hunting entangled phrases with his pen. The moment he is confronted with the pregnancy of his wife his world collapses. Lingering fears and painful memories overwhelm him and he needs to trace the missing piece.

David Fidalgo:

Sandwich Cat

Spain, 2022. 11 minutes.

David lives alone with his kitty, Sandwich Cat. It seemed like an ordinary day, but an unexpected visit will lead him to a crucial reflection to humanity.

Aspasia Kazeli:

My Mother the Sea

Estonia, 2022. 6 minutes.

My mother’s journey to eternity through my path of grief.

Balázs Turai:

Amok

Hungary, 2022. 14 minutes.

After losing his fiancée and his good looks in a freak accident, Clyde must confront his inner demon.

Content warnings for this screening
Theme warning: death
Scene warning: death, traffic accident