WHAT IS IT?

During the festival week, members of the Filmlab for Teenagers will watch films, think of, talk about cinema, and, of course, try making movies of their own.
Even for the most talented kids, a week is not enough to master filmmaking, but Filmlab curators do not see that as their goal. What they aim for is to explain how film language works and how cinema is fundamentally different from other art forms such as theatre or literature. Cinema is drama, camerawork and acting put together. At Filmlab classes, students will analyse examples from well-known films, although the main goal of this programme is to take away the fear of filming, and of expressing oneself.
Each day will be divided into several segments. The first will comprise lectures, delivered in a lively form and combined with discussions. The second part will be games, and the last segments will feature hands-on sessions — every day students will get a new creative assignment.

CURATORS

Elena Vanina
Journalist and screenwriter. Former deputy editor-in-chief of Afisha culture and lifestyle magazine. Her stories appeared in the magazines Afisha, Bolshoy Gorod, Esquire, Takie Dela. She co-wrote TV-series "Zavtra", "Quest", "Londongrad" and "The Optimists", the last of which won Russia's Golden Eagle award as the best TV series of 2018. Elena has been working with children since 2005. She is a tutor at Kamchatka, a creative summer camp, and also leads workshops and gives lectures on screenwriting.

Kirill Kulagin
Studied film direction at VGIK. He directed more than 50 commercials for brands like PepsiCo, Cartier, Adrenaline Rush, Lays, Kia, Lexus, Yota and Norilsk Nickel. Kirill directed the best commercial of 2016 on Russian YouTube, according to Google. He took part in the production of Mind the Gap, a film featuring Willem Dafoe. Kirill authored the concept of the interactive project norilskfilm.com, which he also produced. Projects he has worked on won numerous prizes, including RedDot, ADCR, Awwwards, KIAF, the RUnet Prize, Red Apple, White Square, IDEA, an award by the Russian Television Academy, Best Non-fiction Film by the Russian Guild of Film Critics.

What is it?

The Animation Workshop is created for the youngest residents of the Kaliningrad region, aged 7-11. Over the course of five days, the participants will learn about all stages of creation of a cartoon, from an idea and the story board to sound recording. All children will try different roles - screenwriter, director, artist, animation artist and voice artist. Together with their curators they will create an alternative portrait of Kaliningrad.

The participants will have a chance to transform the familiar urban environment through real and imaginary characters and stories. They will look for inspiration in courtyards and streets, find the counter-intuitive and then add things even more improbable. Photographs captured during this scouting will provide the background for the end result an animated film to be screened at the closing of the Kaliningrad International Film Festival "On the Edge: Go West."

CURATORS

The authors and tutors of the creative workshop are directors and teachers at St. Petersburg's Studio "DA", an animation studio.

Sasha Pivovarova is a director and teacher at Studio "DA", she's an animation artist of cartoon series Flying Animals, a charity project.

Nastya Tuzlukova is a director and a teacher at Studio "DA". She was formerly an animation artist at Melnitsa Animation. She is also a book illustrator and a set designer, and leads an art therapy workshop for children.

Ulyana Belkina is a teacher at Studio "DA". She was formerly an organiser and leader of the summer camps Kavardak, Buduschee Segodnya and others. Ulyana creates role-playing games and games based on the learning through play model. She is also a poet and a dancer.

WHAT'S THAT?

School students from grades 8 to 11 who live in Kaliningrad, are commited to their city and eager to learn more about it are invited to join the Urban Development Workshop. Within a few days the participants will not only learn how to conduct urban research by doing it, but will also design, develop and implement a comprehensive creative project based on that survey and dedicated to one of the city's districts. The workshop will culminate in the public presentation of the project to the city.

CURATOR

The Urban Development Workshop's Chief Curator Mikhail Alekseevsky is an anthropologist who for many years has been exploring Russian cities from Kaliningrad to Vladivostok. He tells wonderful stories about them and promises to teach all willing participants to study the city's key features via… online memes! Kirill Blagodatskih and Anna Naumova, graphic designers who have come up with the festival's signature style and brand identity, will assist the participants of the Urban Development Workshop in creation and implementation of their Kaliningrad-oriented creative project.

WHAT'S THAT?

The workshop by Olga Privolnova, who graduated from Marina Razhbezhkina's School of Documentary Film and Documentary Theatre, focuses not so much on the art of documentaries as on busting stereotypes about what documentary filmmaking actually is. The Documentary Workshop is all about mastering the optics, being able to observe and see. Starting from day one, the participants, aged 18 to 40, go out on the street with a camera. Their mission is to purposefully shine the light of their attention on what remains unseen by most people. To see the worlds obscured by trite and boring words like "reality," "actuality" and "the mundane."

The Documentary Workshop: for the SUSPICIOUS, HUNGRY AND BOLD. For those aged 18 to 40 who SUSPECT the world is not limited to the cozy "inner circle" and book knowledge, who are HUNGRY for information and emotion, who crave new lives to live with their characters, to find answers and acquire new questions, who can BOLDLY tell the others: I'm interested in you, may I hang around with my camera?

From April 22 till May 2 the participants of the workshop will complete daily direction tasks – finding stories, filming, editing and eventually creating their independent short documentary.

CURATOR

Olga Privolnova – documentary and feature filmmaker. "Oasis," "ZVISZHI," The Little Prince," A Day in the Life of..." and "Through," directed by Ms. Privolnova, have been selected for and won at many national and international film festivals. Since 2014, Olga Privolnova has been curating numerous cinema labs.

WHAT'S THAT?

The Kaliningrad International Film Festival "On the Edge: Go West" is delighted to invite you to participate in the festival's special project – the Documentary Theatre Workshop, which will take place from April 23 till May 3. The Workshop will focus on exploring Kaliningrad and creating an "urban mythos" by collecting the residents' stories and writing a play based on them.

WHO ARE WE LOOKING FOR?

You are an adult with enough free time on your hands within the specified period. You are interested in people around you and eager to personally engage in play-writing.

What to Expect
Over the course of 10 days, the Workshop participants will get to know the ins and outs of documentary theatre. Led by director Alexander Kudryashov and playwright Lyuba Strizhak, they will talk to the city's residents and collect their stories to form the basis for the play. Choreographer Natalya Shurganova will conduct training sessions alongside this. On the closing day of the Festival the resulting performance of this collaborative work will be presented in The Kaliningrad Regional Drama Theatre.

CURATORS

Alexander Kudryashov – director, "Mumblecore. Pulp Fiction," "Mumblecore. Terminator 2" and "Grown-Up on the Outside" in Teatr.doc, "Life Lessons" – a play inspired by "bro online communities," "Dreams of Yekaterinburg" – a play based on dreams of people who live in the city, "Russian Folk Post" and "The River Returns" in the Engagement Theatre in Tyumen. Mr. Kudryashov has been actively putting up plays in different Russian cities.

Lyuba Strizhak – playwright, writer. Author of "Are You Interested," "When the Sun Goes Down (Marina)," "Canvas Shoes," "A Sea of Trees" etc. Her plays have been produced in Moscow (Praktika Theatre, Gogol Centre, Moscow Pushkin Drama Theatre, Kazantsev Playwright and Director Center) and other Russian cities. She is a participant of the Teatr.doc project "Literary Masterpieces for School Students" within the state program "Theatre+society." Ms. Strizhak has taught at the "Class-Act" drama lab organized by Teatr.doc in Mozhaysk Juvenile Prison. Twice, she participated in the lab of the "Kultproekt" artistic union "A Live Author for A Live Theatre" (in Norilsk and Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky). Since 2012, Lyuba Strizhak has been working with the regional public organization "Perspektiva" as educator. She has curated the "Open Circle" teen lab within the "Teenage.doc" project by Teatr.doc.

Natalya Shurganova – choreographer

WHAT'S THAT?

During the festival week the workshop participants aged 18 to 30 will conduct a minor investigation, both historical and journalistic in nature. Led by the curators, they will talk to several old residents of Kaliningrad currently living in a soldiers' home and record them speaking about their lives. A series of audio clips with life stories' fragments about the city, time, and the happiest day of their lives, will then be produced.

CURATORS

Ekaterina Lamm – producer; Editor, Arzamas educational project. A graduate from the Faculty of Journalism, MSU, she has worked for the Bazelevs Studio and The School for Scandal TV Show.

Vyacheslav Rogozhnikov – Special Projects Editor, Arzamas educational project; Author, "Old Residents. Private History of Tsaritsyno" Project, Tsaritsyno Museum-Reserve.