SCREEN 1

Corridor
Mirrors & Tears 
(each set of headphones carries a different sound version of the film)
6m11s, United Kingdom, Directed by Pavel Prokopič
Vertical Divider
"Mirrors & Tears arose from a workshop with eight performers, where I applied experimental directorial techniques to engender affective delivery of a non-specific dialogue between two actors, in combination with expressive lighting techniques. I subsequently edited together brief moments from multiple scripted and improvised sessions (filmed simultaneously on three cameras) to give rise to a new disconnected, alogical structure, forging affective rather than narrative meaning." Pavel Prokopič
The presented work includes two sound versions of the film, composed by different artists (Jan Sikl and Rob Szeliga), revealing two very distinct moods – responding to the unpredictable nuance and complexity of human expression. ​

SCREEN 2

Corridor
Nested Cinema: A Cinematic Immersive Experience 
10m20s, United Kingdom, A practice-as-research project led by Pavel Prokopič, in collaboration with Jayne Sayer
Vertical Divider
Nested Cinema is a new immersive experience that complicates the boundaries between the physical and the virtual, between the real and the imaginary. Nested Cinema reimagines film through orchestrating smart technology and devices across three distinct layers of experience – traditional screens, the installation space, and virtual reality – extending cinematic atmospheres across the three nested layers, giving rise to a new immersive mode of dramatic fiction. This short documentary focuses on the practice-as-research process behind the experience.

SCREEN 3

Corridor
Out of the Blue
2m51s, Germany, Directed by Maria Hengge
Vertical Divider
Strobe lights are cast across a woman's figure by a mysterious car flashing blue lights down a nearby road, as she navigates a delirious dream that uncovers demonic memories from the recesses of her mind, among the mist and snow that attempts to conceal them. ‘Out of the Blue’ seeks to reflect visually the intangible and atmospheric nature of dreams, that stays with us long after we wake.
Waiting for Lolo
8m, Canada, Directed by Jules Ronfard
Vertical Divider
Travelling down a country road, a young couple find themselves stranded after running out of fuel, they wait for their friend Lolo to help them back on their journey. With nothing else to do aside from talk, a philosophical conversation arises; they discuss reincarnation, counting the hours until their friend arrives, frustrating each other in the process. Shot in black and white and using different panels to conceal parts of the image, ‘Waiting for Lolo’ uses experimental techniques in its fictional narrative.
Sobras (Leftovers)
11m, Spain, Directed by Pablo Porcuna
Vertical Divider
Sobras is an audiovisual satire that ironically portrays the realities of four different employments. It uses a minimalist and surreal backdrop for each character, with small changes made to identify each career and to create different settings. We see comical and peculiar satirical representations of careers in delivery, fast food, offices and retail.
Divine Mall
13m28s, France, Directed by Barbara Panero
Vertical Divider
Wandering around a shopping mall, Betty questions our PHC – our power to create happiness. In this hybrid between documentary and fiction, Betty and Louis discuss our relationship with the world, their line of dialogue being the only chronology in a narrative of fragmented space and time. As the characters talk people circulate around the mall filtering between floors, parking, shops, escalators, lifts and stairs, they pass in front of the rooftop terrace, offering a glimpse of reality to the fictional characters and adding a documentary aspect to the film.

SCREEN 4

Corridor
Tunnel Wandering
10m40s, Japan, Directed by LI Zehao
Vertical Divider
Using cyanotype on fabric to create a story told through animation, ‘Tunnel Wandering’ is the journey of a pursuit for answers, a journey recounted from a dream in the style of a poem that accompanies the kinetic, pale blue animations. It points to our desire to touch on answers that are so intangible and vague –  "I reach out to feel the wind but all I can touch is my shadow" (Li Zehao – Diector).
Pulvis Es (You Are Dust)
9m03, Portugal, Directed by Micael Espinha
Vertical Divider
Lisbon is deserted, its landscape altered by climate change, stationary shots show a city still aside from the gentle stirring of dust in the wind. Gigantic sand dunes pile up against the city’s decaying walls and now untraversed streets, and with the waters of the Tagus receded, left in its place is a desolate plane of dry land. Now vacant of people, there is no one to disturb the piling sand, books lie on the floor, half-rotten – signs of a civilization that has since disappeared. A poem is transmitted into space.
Broken Love
3m16s, Poland, Directed by Barbara Medajska
Vertical Divider
Broken Love is a film pieced together from the touching and sentimental messages on old postcards, and the changing of their content as they progress through the years from before the war to after. As the years draw closer to the time of the war their messages become deeper, dramatic and desperate – showing the human desire to draw closer to one another during turbulent times. Broken love is shot on time lapse and pre-war 35mm cameras, strengthening the connection between viewers and the writers and recipients of the postcards.
Dystopian Patterns
6m43s, Belgium, Directed by Nouzha Isabelle
Vertical Divider
The sun crawls across a desolate city, maybe Beirut. Succumbing to trees that cast dappled shadows along the cracking walls of buildings, it is left to the mercy of the nature that consumes it. A relic of lost civilisation, something happened there, we do not know what. Frames of footage show a lapse of time, where movement is created only through gentle breeze and the turning of the earth on its axis.
Lord Godfrey - Shogun
3m5s, United States, Directed by Nathaniel Akin
Vertical Divider
Music video for the track ‘Shogun’ by Lord Godfrey. It is an ‘80s fever dream’ and a melting pot combining 1980s retro-futuristic iconography with depictions of '80s idols such as Blondie, princess Diana and Prince. A flowing stream of images capturing the zeitgeist of '80s western culture, backed with a soundtrack to match its bright and vibrant colours.

SCREEN 5

Corridor
Etwas Nutzlos (Somewhat Useless)
6m21s, United Kingdom, Directed by Eric J. Liddle
Vertical Divider
Etwas Nutzlos is a surrealist short film where, in the midst of an unnecessary estrangement, Stefan, a perplexed young man, records a voice note. In his voice note he discusses thoughts, who they belong to, and the version of ourselves that lies beneath the surface we show to others. He discusses the security of keeping our thoughts to ourselves but can’t deny the freedom that comes with sharing these thoughts, and the freedom of no longer belonging to ourselves.
Chrysalis
11m22s, Iceland, Directed by Eydís Eir Björnsdóttir
Vertical Divider
After being diagnosed with Tourette’s syndrome, 13-year-old Vanesska tries to come to terms with her new reality. In the process of adjusting to this she develops an alter ego ‘Katla’, whose curious and almost alien persona helps Vanesska to develop her confidence and self-expression, and to ultimately prevail through the new challenges brought up by her recent diagnosis. The film recognises that many of our problems and neuroses come from the barriers created by our society, family, and culture; and maintains that it is important to still try and express ourselves genuinely and honestly regardless of them.
Flâneurs
5m27s, Italy, Directed by Ivano Lollo
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Shot on black and white 16mm film ‘Flâneurs’ follows two wandering figures as they move aimlessly, through a bustling cityscape –travelling without ever taking a step, in search of something. They are described by the film’s director Ivano Lollo, as “Automatons in ceaseless motion”, driven to constant transit, by the competition within a relentless society. Two opposites moving frame by frame, joining only for brief and fleeting encounters, meeting amidst a ceaseless sea of blurred faces. Lollo describes his use of single frames as mirroring the “almost tribal, rhythm of the urban jungle”.
Pera doesn't know when his wife gave birth, let alone a hippo
10m39s, Serbia, Directed by Teodora Arsic
Vertical Divider
All animals are to stay in the zoo hotel on the hill, indefinitely. New animals are piling in, threatening to permanently crowd the place, a panic erupts at this prospect. The animals need space, their only chance of this is through the guards – creatures that have never known a different fate than their own, and with fears like that of the animals. The guards however speak in a different tongue to the animals and can only offer them the ability to retreat into their minds and live in their dreams, without ever leaving the corner of their rooms. This is a story told through a combination of mixed digital media, animation, and still photography.

SCREEN 6

Green-screen Studio
Bullseye: A Film in Four Movements
70m, United Kingdom, Directed by Matthew Hawkins
Vertical Divider
Bullseye is a film composed of four discrete movements.
Movement 1: durée – in which a man attempts to throw a bullseye
is comprised of a single shot played out over eight minutes. The narrative concerns the Man’s attempt to throw a bullseye in a game of darts.
Movement 2: affection – in which a man meets a woman
focuses on a first date between an unnamed man and an unnamed woman.
Movement 3: deterritorialization – in which a man comes undone
captures The Man’s home life and his (non)-relationship with a stranger who breaks into his back garden and later his home.
Movement 4: agencement // assemblage – in which old images are reacquainted
combines footage from the first three movements in order to disrupt the linearity of the previous narratives. This final movement has a cyclical structure. The film begins and ends on an image of The Man throwing darts. It is an extension and development of the ideas and concepts developed in Movement 1 in that the film presents a cycle that cannot really end. The film does not have closure, and the storyline and characters’ relationships are ambiguous.

SCREEN 7

Green-screen Studio
Worry-Fear-Unease. The Triptych
17m24s, United Kingdom, Directed by Agrippina Meshcheryakova
Vertical Divider
In this biblical and renaissance art inspired testament to the human experience, Tonya struggles through another day of unrelenting anxiety, intrusive thoughts and disassociation. Three screens, windowpanes into the differing aspects of her grapple with her psyche, show her day unfold as her desperate calls for help go unanswered. When her boyfriend finally responds, their connection feels distant, overshadowed by Tonya’s overwhelming worries and exhaustion. Drifting into sleep, she wonders if she will ever find peace or will always remain trapped in the haunting grip of her anxiety.
Machines of the night
8m46s, Ecuador, Directed by Diana Orduna Garcés
Vertical Divider
Shot between Berlin and Quito, connecting the two with a series of cuts that warp space time and narrative, ‘Machines of The Night’ explores humanity and its relationship with modernity and hegemony. It follows the universally relatable theme of the human condition from an autobiographical perspective, while combining documentary essay methods with almost science fiction jumps that toy with space and time. Garcia poses questions to the audience: “Have you ever stopped to think about how many calculations you make in a day? Prices, distances, inflation, schedules”, and encourages us to look for the parallels to our own lives.

SCREEN 8

TV Studio
Please note that some work in this section includes mature content.  
Breathing Psoas
14m59s, Germany, Directed by Anja Plonka
Vertical Divider
Evoking questions such as: How can the body relate to nature? And how can they transform together? ‘Breathing Psoas’ explores use of somatic body practices such as breath work to help better understand the idea of what Plonka describes as "The body as an archive of traumatic memories". Idyllic settings connect the human body to nature, with breath mirroring wind, stone mirroring skin and smoke mirroring blood. Images of the human body link to Greek mythology and the myths of the Baobo – a figure who by displaying her vulva, offers comfort to traumatised women.  

SCREEN 9

TV Studio
Please note that some work in this section includes mature content.  
Asterión
15m, Czech Republic, Directed by Francesco Montagner
Vertical Divider
Inspired by the allegory of the minotaur, man and bull are united in their common attempt to cheat death, to survive. Under the burning sun, in a bullfighting arena, a bull laboriously tries to avoid death. It ends up, however, on the cold table of a meticulous taxidermist. As the man is left with the huge cadaver of the untamed beast, something within his psyche is uncovered: a fear of his own mortality, that he finds he can only fend off through the wearing of the animal’s skin. “It’s the story of a double fate, the one of the man and the one of the bull, both doomed to succumb to their own restless natures.” Francesco Montagner.

SCREEN 10

TV Studio
Please note that some work in this section includes mature content.  
We Bites Us
17m25s, Finland/Poland, Directed by Karolina Kucia
Vertical Divider
WE BITES US is a hybrid between live action and animation. The cinematography used in the live-action scenes combines two different points of view: that of a cinematographer and that of an autonomous mobile robot equipped with a camera. At times, the robot is controlled by a wearable "prosthesis", a glove with gyroscopic sensors attached to an actor's body. There is an element of juxtaposition in the film that shows the tension between a code of cinematic narrative and an unfamiliar "alien" perspective. This paradoxical cinematic apparatus is a techno-feminist gesture to see technological innovation neither as a grand futurist dream nor as a seductively sleek toy for the rich, neither as freedom nor as subjugation.

SCREEN 11

TV Studio
Please note that some work in this section includes mature content.  
Remotus
7m21s, Italy, Directed by Simone Alvear Calderon
Vertical Divider
Through the ‘glitch art’ techniques of using digital and analogue errors to create art pieces, ‘Remotus’ is an introspective journey into nightmares and hidden memories of the mind. Its imagery and sound design are psychedelic and almost dread inducing, placing us in the perspective of one enduring nightmares and hidden memories rising up from the pits of our unconscious minds.
Body Legato
6m26s, United States, Directed by Sam Drake
Vertical Divider
Dissociative and disembodied, we see the journey of a cow as it becomes meat, in a film that combines an esoteric, contemplative perspective with a distant and withdrawn, almost documentary style. Just as the cow becomes meat, man becomes angel, while a surveillance balloon hovers overhead, we wonder which destination is favourable.
Frustration
4m19s, Spain, Directed by Alberto Martín-Aragón, Julia Doménech
Vertical Divider
Two people possessed by the feeling of having failed in life plunge into self-destruction, hectic and unrelenting, the world moves around these two figures taking them in thrall. Objects like cameras, guns and money consume their minds as they ponder the question: "How did it come to this?"
The Element of Surprise
9m36s, United States, Directed by Pawel Grajnert
Vertical Divider
 ‘The Element of Surprise’ is a pseudo-narrative film set in a post-industrial age city. Two men plagued by the paranoia of being hunted down for reasons unknown, flee the city hoping, at least in part, to free themselves from the constant awareness of something suspicious and corrupt. In the fractured narrative that often swaps character perspectives, we see a couple’s dispute, a man being chased down, and a questionable television advert.