M O VING DISTRIC T S

MOVING DISTRICTS
European Audiovisual Workshop
Budapest,
19-27. March 2011.
Moving Districts
European Audiovisual Wokrshop
19-27. March 2011.
Moving Districts - European Audiovisual Workshop
The EUShorts Festival is planning an audiovisual workshop for 2011, with the
participation of young people from five European countries. The aim is for the
debuting artists arriving in Budapest to test their creativity, their artistic ambitions
and to gain useful experience with the help of Hungarian filmmakers. They will
also have the opportunity to work with several European directors invited to the
festival and get acquainted with the works of Hungarian artists and cultural
institutions.
The
one-week
workshop
will
offer
the
conditions
for
cooperating
in
an
environment encompassing several areas of the audiovisual artistry (film,
photography, graphic design, new media). The workshop aims to help participants
create something new and fresh by harnessing the creative potential in this
international and interdisciplinary environment through roundtable discussions
and several unique workshop tasks.
The event will draw focus on the diversity of methods in urban audiovisual
expression,
the
creative
games
with
cinematical
genres
and
the
reconsideration of traditional aesthetic borders. The workshop aims to utilize
imagination, spontaneity and professional ingenuity. To track the influence
participants have on their own professional and cultural development and to see
how they are able to influence the image of Budapest of locals and foreigners
through their work.
The workshop and its program are arranged and coordinated by the EUShorts team
for
simultaneously
entertainment.
experiencing
an
intellectual
challenge
and
creative
A Short Introduction of the EUShorts Festival
The EuShorts Festival is a cultural encounter between the Hungarian audience and
the finest of contemporary European short films. Films that have earned praise
from critics and audiences alike for their unique humour, rich visuality or possibly
with their shocking earnestness. Films that are practically absent in Hungary due
to the lack of events to present them. EuShorts would like to fill in this gap in
Budapest yet for the fiifth time with a diverse and excellent selection in 2011.
Organized by dedicated young people the program aims to elevate the current
status of the genre of shorts and illuminate both the diversity and cohesion of
our old continent. The weeklong festival also aims to strengthen the culture of
art-cinemas, and manifest a pan-European cultural identity for young people.
Why short films?
Short films offer the essence of cinema: creativity, imagination and the opportunity
of discovery. Meeting new trends, points of view and a new generation of
talented filmmakers. This is mainly why short films are more and more popular
abroad, with the size of audiences at related events escalating. To reach the widest
audience possible,
EuShorts brings films to
Budapest that have already
succeded at international festivals and might have won awards.
The 5th EuShorts Festival in 2011 will present award-winning films that are likely to
become popular with the local audience - similar to our earlier festivals in Budapest
and Paris. The 50 selected films will be presented in seven, gO-minute thematic
sections, each shown twice during the five days of the festival. Films will each
range between 3 and 30 minutes in length, representing most of the European
countries, offering a chance to introduce unique perspectives from the old
continent.
The participants
The Polish, British, French and Icelandic participants are all working or studying in
the fields of film, design or new media. The programs of the workshop would like to
connect these strongly intertwined fields through the tasks at hand, which would
require groups that are diverse both in nationality and field of interest. The
programs
require
devotion,
high
communication
skills,
concentration
and
imagination. Participants have to be open and creative; they should be European
citizens who would like to perform at their best and help others perform at the
same leve" to create something new and unique.
Preparations
The selected participants will have to actively prepare for the event in November.
Every nationality has to present an artist from their country, who they think
determines the audiovisual culture of their home. To stray away from
stereotypes, we would favor artists and personalities, less familiar to foreign
audiences, yet have a dominant role in the current cultural life of their country.
Their first task is to conduct an interview with the person and create a video
presenting his or her significance.
Programs
The program would actively include every field mentioned in the introduction,
paying close attention to using them in a cinematic context. Every event and work
happening and produced during Moving Districts (photos, videos, graphic
works, writings) will be available on the blog set up for the workshop, so they may
be tracked and enjoyed by the audience, as well as foreign partnering
organizations.
Budapest from another perspective
With the help of historians and university scholars we would invite the participants
for an unconventional sightseeing trip in Budapest.
Experts from Budapest
universities will guide us to urban legends and uncover obscure artists in the
hidden corners of the city. All these sightseeing trips will be based around a single
theme that will be used at the workshop later on.
Our main objective with this sightseeing trip is to create an end product that would
maybe enable Budapesters to view their own city from a different perspective. The form
of realization in practice would be an artistic product that is done by the joint effort of
young professionals each active on different fields that are required for the completion
of this product.
For this we need young artists from as diverse fields as possible, such as a
photographer, a filmmaker, a graphic artist, i.e. not necessarily filmmakers only.
Although we are not looking for only filmmakers, as the participation of other fields will
enable more complexity and diversity regarding the produced work of art, we do need
young artists that are active and knowledgeable in certain technical areas of
filmmaking, such as photography, editing, directing, custom design, etc.
These young artists would need to already have had some practice in their field of
expertise.
Good knowledge of the English language is a must, as teams will be
multi-national, and adequate communication is key.
Think Twice Workshop would like to show how the diversity in approach that is found in
an international team is able to reshape and reinterpret that way people think about
city and culture. The workshop focuses aims to exploit the multitude of possibilities of
audiovisual expression in an urban setting, enabling creative experimentation with film
genres, and requiring spontaneity, resourcefulness, innovation, talent, dedication
and stamina, all qualities we are looking for in our future participants.
Roundtable discussions
Professional discussions involving Hungarian filmmakers and artists, all related to
the topics of short films and new media. Topics will include:
The past and present of short films after the YouTube boom -New forms and
forums of creating, distributing and projecting films.
Short film and video installation - The narrowing border between cinema and
museum. What defines the function of film?
"Cast"
Every team will receive an "object" on the first day. They will have to use this object
to its fullest potential for a week to create a concept around it with the audiovisual
instruments at hand. The object could end up as a key element of Moving Districts,
as a logo, part of its advertising or its main character.
In this part of the workshop, teams will be given a random object (e.g. Christmas
decorations, magnifying glass, etc). The team will have to come up with ways to use this
object in the film, as well as for the film. In the case of Christmas lights, they could be
used as part of the plot as well as an object of lighting. The magnifying glass should
likewise be used multiple ways. The purpose for this is to reinterpret and widen the
framework of representation using the given object in both a concrete and an
abstract context within the same work of art.
"Location Scouting"
Teams will receive a shooting plan that features a district of Budapest and a fictional
world paired up (such as the pair of the Dodgy District and Gotham City).
Participants will have to find a way to recreate that fictional world in the tangible
one. Teams will cooperate with a Hungarian director during this task.
This part of the workshop requires not only techincal knowlegde, but also some
familiarity with audiovisual history in order to be able to come up with assosiations
of a fictional universe in relation to the given setting.
As interaction with locals may be required, canditates should be willing to find forms of
communications that are inventive and resourceful.
"Exercise In Style"
Shoot short films or film clips based on stories heard during the sightseeing trips.
The films must be completed in peripheral genres most fitting to the stories (horror,
sci-fi). No dialogues are allowed.
Organizers will provide technical equipments and conditions necessary to complete
the tasks.
All in all, we we need young artists with some experience in the above mentioned
fields, possessing the above mentioned qualities. We endeavour to give them as
diverse tasks as possible, and hope that the workshop will be a fulfilling experience both
in terms of artistic development, but also on a personal level.
Publicity
The workshop blog will publish all news and works of the program. New videos and
reports posted will provide an interesting experience even for those who are
not interested in audiovisual art. Working with respected Hungarian actors,
directors and artists will provide larger coverage in the media. Straining the
borders of genres will provide new ways of self-expression for a new
generation of culture consumers.
Further information: [email protected]