Friday, September 3

21:00 Opening of the festival and exhibition “The Best of Waterpieces 2000 – 2010″

21:30 Program of the Baltic video art competition

23:00 Awarding of the best Baltic video work

23:30 Program from the archive of the International Short Film Festival Oberhausen (DE)

Saturday, September 4

21:00 MUU presentation (FIN)

21:30 MUU on the Catwalk: selection of Finnish video art (FIN)

22:30 Selection of the 13th Japan Media Arts Festival (JP)

00:00 Waterpieces’ 2010 International video art program

Sunday, September 5

21:30 Selection of the 2nd Oslo Screen festival (NO)

23:00 Selection of the Art film and video archive Filmform 2009 (SE)

The International Short Film Festival Oberhausen is one of the major international crossroads for the short form, unique in the range of forms and genres it presents to the public, and particularly well known for its spotlight on experiments.

In short film, anything is possible: formally, content-wise, or aesthetically. Hard to pin down, extremely open – and for that reason endlessly fascinating – short film remains an inexhaustible reservoir from which cinema, television, Internet and even the museum cull new visual languages. Oberhausen’s competitions are equally open to artistic and cinematic trends, they are exhibitions as well as film programmes. The festival is always looking for works that defy tradition, that have the courage to try out something new.

Oberhausen stands for short distances, intensive discussions, sold-out theatres and plenty of opportunities to make contacts. The four competitions, featuring some 140 new films and videos from all around the world, attract television programme editors as well as curators, festival representatives and journalists.

Program from the archive of the International Short Film Festival Oberhausen:

Pierce, Crush, Escape: Notes on the Boreal / Susan Turcot (CA)

10:00, 2008

Trees become animals, animals become people and people become trees in this experimental acoustic meditation on the environment. Turcot continues her abstract exploration of deforestation and its effects on animals, humans and the climate.

Prrrride / Sirah Foighel Brutmann, Eitan Efrat (NL/IL)

3:00 / 2008

A story of familiar human complexity. The relation between a mother and a son. Their relation towards compulsory military service.

Murphy / Bjorn Melhus (DE)

3:30, 2008

“Murphy” is a true abstract post-traumatic stress disorder.

Coal Spell / Sun Xun

7:30 / 2008

Inspired by an old five yuan RMB note, the artist gives an account of the rise and fall of Fuxin, an old industrial city located in northeastern China questioning both the notion of history and of power…

Contre-jour / Christoph Girardet, Matthias Muller (DE)

10:00 / 2009

The look with which we comprehend the world and which it casts back at us in response breaks up into disquieting fragments in “Contre-jour”. Blurs, flashes and stroboscope montages disintegrate reality into shadowy images that inflict pain on the eye.

The Sea Is a Stereo, Video Number 2, Paris Without a Sea / Mounira al Solh (LB)

13:00 / 2008

“The Sea is a Stereo” is an ongoing series of reflections on a group of men who swim everyday at the beach in Beirut no matter the circumstances: rain, wind, war… Even in this moment, the men might be swimming or preparing themselves to do so.

Fiction Follows Forms / Julia Oschatz (DE)

3:00 / 2008

In “Fiction Follows Forms” all the elements from the painter, filmmaker and designer are drowned together in a Beckett-like world. Things can get a bit absurd but they will, in one way or another, follow a form.

n.n. / Michel Klofkorn (DE)

11:00 / 2009

I don’t want to live like a dove in your Europe.

Ketamin – Hinter dem Licht / Carsten Aschmann (DE)

21:00, 2009

Driving through the mountains. The sounds of chords, beauty, art and death echo through the places and elements. The trip ends in the city of Venice which appears exhausted and deserted.

The Parable of the Tulip Painter and the Fly / Charlotte Pryce (USA)

4:00, 2008

An intoxicating flower; a metaphorical insect; a longing reach across the centuries. A philosophical search drenched in luminous colours and sparkling light.

The Artists’ Association MUU represents and promotes professional artists working across a wide range of disciplines in the fields of media and experimental arts. MUU was founded in 1987 out of the need for an association for artists’ working with video, performance, installations, environmental art, sound art etc. The Finnish word muu means “something else”. In August 2010, MUU has 550 artists members. MUU organises several important festivals and events: The Amorph! International Performance Art Festival has been arranged since the mid-1990s. The international performance art festival Performance2011 is part of next year’s European Capital of Culture project in Turku. The international sound art project Audio Autographs includes events, publications, seminars and workshops, with an online radio as its main meeting point. www.muu.fi/sounds

MUU on the Catwalk – A Selection of Finnish Video Art:

1.Jarno Harakkamäki: Making Something Out Of Nothing

2.Juan Kasari: Giving People the Run Around Helsinki

3.Juhani Koivumäki: Sin

4.Juha Mäki-Jussila: The Well

5.Hanna Ojamo: Rush

6.Olga Palomäki: Distortions

7.Pauliina Salminen: 8 Crossings

8.Mailis Saralehto Rekola: Le Podium – Deconstructing the Catwalk

9.Outi Sunila: Labyrinth

Total duration of the screening 40 min.

Curators Hannele Romppanen and Timo Soppela

Produced by Artists’ Association MUU, Finland

In co-operation with NOASS, Latvia

MUU on the Catwalk presents a selection of video works by members of the Artists’ Association MUU as part of the Waterpieces festival in Riga. The screenings are held in the floating art gallery Betanovuss on the AB dam. Video is the most prominent aspect of the field of experimental artforms on the new boundaries of visual art that has emerged around the MUU association. The nine very different Finnish artists featured in the festival are united by the medium of the moving image and an interest in humanity. The themes explored in the works cover different aspects of life and change, the relationship of the individual to the self and the environment, social alienation and the irrationality of existence. The approaches range from personal reflections to observations of social phenomena.

In Making Something Out of Nothing by Jarno Harakkamäki, a young man dressed in a black and wearing an eye mask talks about the meaning and meaninglessness of existence. In Giving People the Run Around Helsinki, Juan Kasari uses performative and conceptual video art to investigate the contemporary urban environment and human behaviour. The piece is made in collaboration with the American video and performance artist Lee Walton. Juhani Koivumäki’s Sin presents a situation that serves as a metaphor for our need to transcend our human boundaries. The piece resembles the story of Lot’s wife who turned into pillar of salt when she disobeyed the command not to look back.

The Well by Juha Mäki-Jussila is a bubbling plunge into the deep waters of the subconscious, from where forgotten memories rise to the surface. Hanna Ojamo’s Rush is a short film about industrialisation and its impact on people’s lives in post-war Europe. The film is the third part in a series based on black and white archive material. In Distortions, Olga Palomäki makes visible an experiential world dominated by irrational fear. The video is a journey into a disoriented, isolated and blocked mind.

In 8 crossings by Pauliina Salminen, a river divides the town of Guwahati in north-east India. On one bank is a village, on the other a city. A group of people shuttle between the two realities every day. Le Podium – Deconstructing the Catwalk by Mailis Saralehto Rekola combines decadence and transgression with the visual idiom of the catwalk. The central thematic of the piece is the continuous movement in fashion itself. In the video Labyrinth by Outi Sunila, two rats wander around a grey and dull labyrinth, searching for the impulse – an irritating sound that interrupts the routine and safe silence. Rats are not humans, even though they act very similarly.

The Japan Media Arts Festival is an annual festival held by Japan’s Agency for Cultural Affairs since 1997.

During the festival, awards are given in four categories: Art (formerly called Non-Interactive Digital Art), Entertainment (formerly called Interactive Art; including video games and websites), Animation, and Manga. Within each category, one Grand Prize, four Excellence Prizes, and (since 2002) one Encouragement Prize are awarded. These are sometimes also called Japan Media Arts Awards.

The 13th Japan Media Arts Festival Selection:

Hibi No Neiro (Tone of everyday) / Nakamura Magico, Nakamura Masayoshi, Kawamura Masashi, Hal Kirkland (JP/AU)

3:51, 2009

“What are the really important things for us in this world that is flooded with various senses of value?” The answer to this song-like question should be the same no matter how much our civilization has evolved. This music video was done by editing video materials shot with webcams by cooperating fans, and conveys to us the feeling of connecting with people.

Ogre You Asshole “Pinhole” / Monno Kazue, Nagata Takeshi (Tochka) (JP)

3:46, 2009

This music video portrays the members of OGRE YOU ASSHOLE having a picnic on a small planet. At the end of the day, they sing all night long and play instruments made of linear lights.

Towa Tei “Mind Wall (feat. Miho Hatori) / Nakamura Takeshi (JP)

4:00, 2009

Let’s get rid of barriers in our mind and set ourselves free; let’s stop thinking; let’s surrender ourselves to the natural flow of life, like being in a child’s dream.

The Last Piece (Chapter of Kyosuke Kijima) / Mizuno Takanobu (JP)

2:35, 2009

People in modern society have different problems of their own. The Last Piece depicts mysterious incidents that occur to people through a series of music videos. In the first episode, a NEET young man named KIJIMA Kyosuke encounters an alien creature that suddenly appears in front of him. The drawing is dynamically animated, yet the pictures exhibit a simple and warm sensation.

Grained time / Goshima Kazuhiro (JP)

13:00, 2009

This work seeks to portray each still picture as an individual photon reaching the retina, and to express the grains of sensation accumulated as “recognition.” It consists of two stages, one being an uncertain camera, which accumulates still pictures from different perspectives, while the other, factor light, gathers the shadows cast by light from a single source to draw the space.

Parallel / Owen Eric Wood (CA)

7:27, 2009

The search for meaning in the act of creation begins at the crossroads of art and philosophy. Photography, drawing and video merge to tell the story of an artist who seeks purpose in the act of creation. Through his struggle to reconstruct his own identity, he finds himself caught in a cycle of selfperpetuating artistic expression, where the line between reality and perception is not clearly defined.

Alone / Gerard Freixes Ribera (ES)

3:06, 2008

In mainstream fiction, the heroic characters have always shown individualistic attitudes. In this work, this individualism is taken to its extreme level, allowing the main hero from an old western movie to act completely alone.

French Lessons / Vanessa Louzon (IL)

7:00, 2009

Inspired by the story of her parents, this is a short story about a young Polish woman who meets a young Frenchman and leaves her grey 70s East European life for Paris. The filmmaker cut and rearranged images from a French lesson book that belonged to her mother and an old road map of Europe that belonged to her father, then constructed a new narrative using language lesson clichés that speak about modern life, displacement, and failed dreams.

The Cable Car / Claudius Gentinetta, Frank Braun (CH)

6:44, 2008

While travelling by cable car to a place somewhere in the mountains, an old man treats himself to some snuff. Et voilà! With every sneeze the cable car cabin falls apart more and more. The man, however, is far from accepting his fate, just like that.

Animal Dance / Okawara Ryo (JP)

5:00, 2009

This hand-drawn animation depicts the dynamism of life. All the motions and actions of living are treated as dancing, and synchronized with music. The work makes full use of the characteristics of flat animation such as visualization and linkage of images, and metamorphosis of form.

Lizard Planet / Joko Tomoyoshi (JP)

5:00, 2009

A lizard wrapped in water represents Earth, which is composed of both land and sea. For human beings, living on this earth feels quite natural. However, the earth is both an enormous living organism and a planet in the infinite universe. It would be gratifying if, after seeing this work, the viewer could feel that we live life on a planet that itself is a living existence in space.

Metropolis / Mizue Mirai (JP)

4:45, 2009

This film was created as the opening film of SICAF2009. The growth and decline of a changing city are portrayed using a technique that employs graph paper, which basically restricts movements in all directions. One aim of this work is to emphasize the characteristics of hand-animation through analogue rendering of a material suitable for CG.

Chisato stared / Uekusu Wataru (JP)

5:21, 2009

In this work, a line is used to reflect emotion, and the theme is the sublimation of a complex and continuous moment, like following one phrase

of a song.

Organic / Kozutsumi Pon (JP)

4:00, 2009

This work was created with elements such as images of primary things, primordial things, reincarnation, and the food chain. It consists of minimal lines and colors, and eliminates unnecessary additions so that it becomes simple and attractive. The animation created with only pen and paper could itself be part of an organic world. The last scene leaves a lingering resonance that will make it possible for each viewer to receive a different impression.

Oslo Screen Festival is an international festival for experimental film and video art which started in 2008. The festival finds place at Filmens Hus in Oslo every two years with screenings and presentations of international and Norwegian video art. The main focus of this festival is to promote international video works in Norway and Norwegian video works abroad. www.screenfestival.no

Jazkamer, Live at Club Urga, Tokyo / Håvard Gjelseth (NO)

1’39”, 2008

Music video, stop motion, shot live with SLR.

React / Fabien Bourdier (FR)

8′, 2009

React is featuring active chemical reactions of everyday products. Immersion in the natural phenomena of small scale, effervescence, mousses, gels, sprays, fuels are spatialized and amplified. The outside world colorful then invited to hypnosis and the fascination of the organic power of these “micro” reactions. An appeal to the imagination and the poetry of little things.

Motholic mobble part 3 / Kaia Hugin (NO)

6’38”, 2009

By use of cinematic elements, patience, time and labor, a “real film trick” is carried out. The piece balances between Sisyphean desperation and the humorous. It might be seen as an intervention or interference in nature, or maybe as a longing to feel connected to the vast landscape.

Stone on Stone / Rob Carter (USA)

7’44”, 2009

This stop-motion video animation uses the architectural language of High Gothic and Modernism to invent a contradictory history of their evolvement. The theme begins and ends with the vast, but unfinished Cathedral Church of Saint John the Divine, located on the upper west side of Manhattan, New York.

Exótica / Sérgio Cruz (PT/UK)

5′, 2009

Tracing a path from ancient customs to contemporary social interaction, this film demonstrates the unifying force of music and dance. Somewhere between a dance movie and a documentary. It is the result of a collaboration between Sérgio Cruz and the Portuguese choreographer Miguel Pereira during a three-week artistic residence in Maputo (Mozambique) in March 2008.

The delicate art of the bludgeon / Jean-Gabriel Périot (FR)

4′, 2009

About policemen’s sensibility.

Copy City / Denise Hauser (NO)

4’35”, 2008

Copy City is an experimental short film about marginal worlds, having its roots in the new media development and web 2.0.

Planet A / Momoko Seto (FR/JP)

7’40”, 2008

The world has become a dried out planet, where the growing of cotton, over exploited for economical reasons is the main cause of desertification. A saline desert covers acres of dried out land where strange salt trees appear. This phenomenon echoes an ecological disaster, the desertification of the Aral Sea.

Flights of Sleeping Birds / Gayatri Kodikal (IN)

13′, 2009

This story is inspired by the stories that surround a secret ritual that is performed in Goa. The adventures of two grandchildren with their grandfather in the mystical realms of their ancestors. An explosion of visuals and illusions swim into their lives.

My Father’s Letters / Yana Sakellion (USA)

2’11”, 2008

This piece is based on personal narrative and expresses my early fascination with handwritten letter-forms and textile qualities of handwriting. I am employing digital video and animation to convey my childhood associations between the object and the meaning, while experimenting with kinetic typography.

Stultifera Garden / Johanna Domke (DE)

11’26”, 2008

The traditional garden is a place where the entire world is represented in highly symbolic symmetry and perfection. Stultifera Garden deals with an overlapping structure of the public and the private. The continuos pan shot shifts from a classic park scene into a dystopic, mazy structure of trails.

Requien Granular / Tomaz Klotzel (BR)

6’50”, 2008

An audiovisual composition inspired by the musical theory of the granular synthesis, which is based on the organization of music in small sound pieces, called grains. The footage used to create the Requien Granular grains are old sport film from the last century, mainly football from the 50′s to the 80′s. Requien Granular talks about life and it’s passing, time long ago, actors – heroes? – already dead or incapable of the shown performances, empty of that virility. It’s a reflexion about every present moment of the life, and of being present at every moment.