This year, LINOLEUM Contemporary Animation and Media Art Festival will run online between September 1st and 5th in Kyiv. The festival team received 2892 submissions from 75 countries. Among them, 79 were chosen to participate in the competition section of the festival. The winners will be selected in the following categories: International competition (45 films), Ukrainian competition (10 films) and Commissioned films competition (24 films).
The international competition section, which contains most of the films, is divided by the curators into five blocks (45 films). Each one is named after one film from the block that offers the most in-depth reflection on a given topic.
The first block, Invisibles, explores the best and the worst world – the inner world of individuals. The film from Romania under this title shows one day from the life of a young woman who lives with her family but does not feel safe. Escape to the secret corners of her consciousness seems to her to be the best way out, but is it really the case? We'll find out at the festival.
The second competition block – No Title. According to the festival team, some things are hard to define, but they can reveal themselves through animation. The Canadian film that gave the name to this selection explores the ambiguous relationship between the artists, their work and their audience.
The third competition block is called Natural Selection. It envisions the end of the world – both real and metaphorical. The self-titled film from Bosnia and Herzegovina offers a journey into the surreal world of humanoid animals that have lost touch with their nature and lost their sense of purpose. Interesting allusion, isn't it?
The fourth competition block, Affairs of the Art, lets artists speak. Animators reflect on their existence and art, sometimes with a touch of irony. That is the case of the film from the United Kingdom about a very peculiar family: a factory worker who is totally obsessed with drawing, her son who is a technical geek and her sister - a fanatical taxidermist.
The last block of the international competition is named All Those Sensations in My Belly. The focus of this block is put on the whole spectrum of human emotions, both positive and negative.
The self-titles film shows us the feelings of a transgender woman who goes a long way to overcome fear and shame and reaches emotional balance. This selection also features the film My Fat Arse and I by Ukrainian artist Yelyzaveta Pysmak who participated in Cannes' Cinéfondation student competition programme. The animator is originally from Chernihiv, she currently studies in Lodz, Poland.
The Ukrainian competition programme consists of one block in which ten powerful works will compete for the prize. Our animators do their best for us to be proud of them and for their work to be admired. Deep Water has already been nominated by the prestigious Animafest Zagreb, while Unnecessary things and Tiger is Strolling Around got recognition at LA Shorts International Film Festival. Different in genre and themes, all these films raise important issues.
As part of the program, but out of competition, a premiere of a documentary film Papier-mâché in memory of Oleg Pedan will take place. It was created by his student Anastasia Falileieva.
Launched in 2018 as an experiment, today the Commissioned films competition is a full participant of LINOLEUM. This year, for the fourth time, it will entertain, surprise and inspire the viewers with the newest cases from advertising, educational, social content and the music industry. A total of 24 animated films will compete for the prize. Each one challenges the mundane and sets an example of how commercial works can be truly innovative and distinctive. This selection includes four films from Ukraine – two promotion videos from Lviv creative agency AND ACTION and Anastasiia Falileieva, and music videos for the bands Gibkiy Chaplin and Vagonovozhatye.
