Full houses, huge interest to all programs of the festival, wonderful technical and artistic level of organization, a lot of new names, meetings, discoveries, victories, experience, living emotions, a lot of various animation works that was selected thoroughly and with love – this is the result of four days, inspired by the beginning of Kyiv autumn, spent in a creative space on the bank of the Dnipro, ArtPRICHAL.
The festival moved to Kyiv from Moscow last year as a result of the changes in Russian legislation on the work of non-commercial foundations from abroad. So, the founder of LINOLEUM is a Russian businessman who works in Germany, Michael Tsarev, became a foreign agent in his fatherland.
“I caught myself thinking that I was self-censuring while selecting works for the festival. Nobody forbade anything, but I understand that some national provocations in animated films, violence scenes may cause numerous unnecessary inspections and questions of the authorities. Because I felt suffocating in Moscow, I stopped to enjoy the festival. I would have closed it, but after the Maidan, my friends advised to bring LINOLEUM to Kyiv,” TSAREV says. “I think Ukrainians need this festival more now. We can show that the country’s life is not focused on the war only.”
The topic of this year’s forum, “Cloud of Dust,” appealed at the same time to the social improvements in Ukraine and world technological trends: after the global changes in Ukraine a whole cloud of dust rose in the air, and it prevents us from seeing things clearly. This cloud will be either blown away by the wind, or the dust will simply settle. On the other hand, the Cloud can hide and store a huge amount of information from different corners of the world.
Though the conceptual name of the festival was the “Cloud of Dust,” it started a storm. There was a huge response, the Kyiv audience welcomed the festival. LINOLEUM suits Kyiv very well. It is very similar to the character of Kyivites. It is intelligent, and at the same time modern, topical, living, it makes even the animation picture inside of you change.
Within the framework of the forum a variety of genre and topical “cloud programs” were presented: contemporary animation in music, advertizing, 18+ animation, experimental animation, collection of the best works over the entire history of the festival, “Best of 10 years LINOLEUM,” program “Best of Animate Cologne” from CologneOFF based in German Cologne, and of course the screenings of the works of the winners and competitors. So, apart from the emotional impressions, the festival had also practical results. The jury of LINOLEUM headed by the patriarch of Ukrainian animation Davyd Cherkasky divided the top places almost unanimously.
The victory in the category “Best Ukrainian Animation Film” and 1,000 dollars cash prize for the film The Fish-Tailed Girl went to director Serhii Melnychenko. The film was shot in stereo 3D (for the first time in Ukrainian animation) and had a budget of 1,584,561 hryvnias. The Grand prix of LINOLEUM 2015 and the 4,000 dollars cash prize for the film We Can’t Live without Cosmos (Russia) went to director Konstantin Bronzit. Bronzit’s Kyiv victory was preceded by his victory in Europe’s biggest International Animation Festival held in the French town of Annecy and a grand prix in Zagreb.
Michael Tsarev Art Projects fund supported educational and production studio “Chervony sobaka” with 5,000 hryvnias for development and future achievements in animation industry, the directors are Olena Holubieva and Serhii Melnychenko. Special Jury mention went to Dji. Death Sails by Dmitri Voloshin (Moldova).
Special certificates of the jury that included Wilfried Agricola de Cologne from Germany (director and curator of artvideoKOELN international), special guest Motomichi Nakamura from Japan, Vlad Troitsky, Oleksandr Soloviov, Lilia Mlynarych, Yegor Olesov, Volodymyr Lykov, Michael Tsarev, and Roman Balaian, went to Daniel Suljic (Croatia, film Transparent Man) for the staging and original presentation of the subject; Marina Karpova (Russia, film Little Cow) for the best animation film for children; Frederic Hainaut and Simon Medard (film Between Up and Down) for the original treatment of the subject; Borys Bubnov (Ukraine, Always Coca-Cola) for the artistic decision and original animation; 20 animation artists from 9 countries; film Owl me Tender for the teamwork in creation of a music video. On the whole, the competition program featured 50 films, which had been selected from 120 ones, submitted by animators from 30 countries of the world.
The main star of LINOLEUM 2015 was the animation samurai, world star VJ Motomichi Nakamura with his art performance. A man of the world, he has been living for the past four years in Ecuador. Working in the sphere of animation, video installation, digital graphics, VJ art, Motomichi professes absolute minimalism in the work with color and graphic elements, and also turns to basic human emotions and fears. The digital animation artist has worked in many countries practically in all spheres of digital media. His animation and graphic are mainly based on the three-color panel, black, red, and white, which is already hyperprofessional, something in power of only the islanders of the country of the rising sun. In Kyiv he showed wonderful mapping above the newly built Havana bridge, admitting that this was the first time in his career, held a very successful master class and an ultra trendy party with VJ, DJ art, dances, and emotions that went off-scale. As a result, the audience was haunting him during the festival, and Motomichi fell in love with the Kyivites.
Creative producer of the festival El-Kravchuk, who for the first time tried his hand in a new capacity, expected an exclusive audience: artists, advertisers, simply progressive and inquisitive people. The expectations of the art director came true, and his non-standard view on events, attention to details in creation of the atmosphere and visual culture made LINOLEUM a truly cult event.
