Step into a realm where animation dances to its own rhythm and filmmakers are poets with pixels. A programme of experimental, offbeat, peculiar, unorthodox — or brilliant shorts.
Step into a realm where animation dances to its own rhythm. These shorts defy (visual) conventions with flair. They don't just break the rules - they scribble over them, fold them into paper cranes, and set them aflutter. Call these shorts offbeat, experimental, idiosyncratic, peculiar, audacious, unorthodox, or just call them brilliant. These filmmakers are no mere humans, they are poets with pixels, pioneers of the peculiar, serving up visions you never knew you craved but won't soon forget.
Merrimundi is a cosmic dystopian sing-along—an ecstatic transmission from a sentient machine of the future, attempting to speak to us in our crumbling tongue. The film unfolds as a surreal symphony, where singing cherubs dissolve into psychedelic decay: a mad theatre of fading puppets, karaoke, and golden relicts.
Strokes is an abstract movie about searching for beauty in chaos and the mess. Expect hypnotising rhytms and ever-changing forms continually popping up from simple pencil lines.
Witness: An Organima Film is meticulously hand-animated using organic matter. This experimental animated short captures the sentience of small life-forms: ancient beings on stone, an intelligent water droplet, and spirits of sunlight. It lets natural materials guide their own story, while elemental archives invite viewers to question the nature of human purpose and renew their childlike vision.
In this cel animation, painted, formless figures haunt recent photographs of empty public spaces, expressing the helpless, frantic energy of our time. They are displaced from their locations as their environments dissolve and their printed record evaporates.
In de wieg van de Industriële Revolutie wenden arbeiders zich tot de natuur om te herstellen van de zware omstandigheden in de fabrieken. De handgemaakte film Green Lung reflecteert op de geschiedenis van Derby Arboretum, het eerste openbare park van Groot-Brittannië, geopend in 1840 door fabrikant Joseph Strutt.
Cultivation, harvesting and dispersal of thorns is a beautifully animated, poetic and minimalist film about planting, patience, and harvest. Told with tender precision, it shows how a sudden storm wrecks a meticulously planned orchestration.
Through a series of animated art boards depicting a decaying Venice, Venezia Diorama unfolds like a set of postcards, capturing the mythical city's final moments of fragility. Blending archival footage with contemporary observations, and anchored by the story of the 1902 collapse of St Mark's Campanile, Venezia Diorama invites us to reflect on a city slowly eroding, yet suspended in time.
Veils of Landscape takes its title from a phrase in Japan’s traditional 72 micro-seasons, “Kasumi Hajimete Tanabiku,” describing the softening air and hazy mountains of late February. Recognizing that landscapes are shaped by multiple layers of nature, director Chihiro Yamanaka layered several levels of animation to explore how the medium can convey space and time unfolding on screen.
"If it keeps starting over, it must be forever," says the white moth. But a gentle whisper greets each dawn: "One day, all days will be gone." Blending the aesthetics of vector graphics and screen-display technology with the human condition, Ploo is a profound meditation on the fragility of life.
Kaboom Animation Festival is the one-stop-shop for the latest and greatest in all things animated. Ranging from cutting-edge experimental arthouse to colorful stories for families and kids, Kaboom will cater to the animation needs of all. Yes, even yours, my amazing weirdo friend!
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