Conference Fascinations: Romania

For the seventh year in a row, the Conference Fascinations — a supporting industry program featuring an extensive section for experimental documentaries — has focused on the presentation and distribution of motion pictures – both within a big-screen cinema context (festivals, specialized events, and institutions) and in galleries. This year, this retrospective program focuses on Romania. Since the 1960s, there have been a number of centers of the Romanian experimental scene. The artistic collective kinema ikon was founded in Arad; the Sigma art movement began operating in Timișoara, and another center was formed in Bucharest where several unconventional film personalities appeared (one of the most prominent ones being Ion Grigorescu). One filmmaker who really deviated from the typical avant-garde profile was Mircea Saucan, the director of many live-action, feature-length films who is perhaps best known as the man behind the industrial/lyrical, medium-length fairy play Alert!. The retrospective features 24 experimental films made outside of Romania’s official cinema infrastructure during the communist dictatorship.

Romanian Cultural Institute is the partner of the section Conference Fascinations: Romania.

An interview with Călin Dan, the director of the National Museum of Contemporary Art in Bucharest, on Ion Grigorescu's films from the Conference Fascinations: Romania section at the 25th Ji.hlava IDFF.