The Experimental Documentary Level 2 course was designed for teenagers and young adults (14–20) with prior filmmaking experience.
The focus was on expanding documentary language through experimental forms such as animadoc, video essays, and hybrid documentaries.
Participants explored interviews, archives, voice-over, and visual metaphors, learning how deeply personal experiences can be transformed into cinematic form. Throughout the course, they worked through all stages of documentary production — from finding a character and developing a visual concept to editing and sound design.
By the end of the course, participants created 10 experimental short films. Two films received awards at international student film festivals.
Animation / Documentary
Alina Kurylo, 17 — Poland / Ukraine
A poetic meditation on nostalgia and memory. Sounds, fragments, and images form a sensory symphony of the past — raising the question: how do we remember without drowning in what was?
Documentary
Artem Sytnik, 18 — Norway / Ukraine
An autobiographical journey from early childhood to adulthood. Through memories packed into a black suitcase, the film reflects on youth, identity, and the emotional baggage we carry with us.
Animation / Documentary
Olha Rzhevska, 17 — Germany / Ukraine
A playful yet unsettling exploration of propaganda and information overload. The film questions trust, manipulation, and the invisible forces shaping our beliefs — subtly challenging the viewer themselves.
Animation
Valeria Macohon, 15 — Ukraine
An animated reflection on body image and self-acceptance. Voices of people aged 10 to 45 respond to a simple but painful question: how do we live with parts of ourselves we don’t like?
Documentary / Experimental
Anastasiia Ishchenko, 18 — UK / Ukraine
A school assignment becomes an emotional excavation. Writing about “home” turns into a confrontation with loss, displacement, and the impossibility of describing what no longer exists.
Documentary
Julia Kolesnikova, 17 — Ukraine
Alice is young and full of ambition. After moving from her hometown to a big city, she faces the reality of a demanding profession and a new way of living. A quiet observational portrait of transition — from barracks to a dormitory, from expectations to lived experience.
Documentary / Experimental
Ruslana Kavun, 16 — France / Ukraine
Sometimes it is hard to live without the past, but even harder to live while holding onto it. An introspective reflection on memory, emotional distance, and the invisible weight of what can’t be left behind.
Documentary
Sofia Ruzhina, 20 — Italy / Ukraine
Maria Maximova (stage name MARI MAX) dreams of becoming a singer. Fame and recognition seem close — yet reality intervenes. A film about fragile hope, ambition, and the tension between dreams and circumstances we cannot change.
Documentary
Aleksandra Obolentseva, 17 — Ukraine A personal journey into the atmosphere of the post-Soviet 1990s, revealing the story of one family amid social change and a new way of life in the Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhia.
