The International StopTrik Film Festival, produced by Pekarna Magdalenske mreže, invites you to a curated selection of animations that will be screened at the pop-up cinema in the garden next to OBRAT – a space for art and participation at Trg revolucije 9. This green corner, just by the main bridge, becomes an open-air cinema during the Lent Festival. Once again, with our improvised cinema, we are giving space back to cinema – to the cinema the city lacks.

The outdoor projections consist of stop-motion animations and animations in other techniques in three curated programs. The first program features films from StopTrik's partner festival O!PLA from Poland. The second program brings some of the best animations from last year’s StopTrik edition, including the winning Madeleine. In the third program, Animated Palestine, we will screen three stop-motion animations by Palestinian director and animator Ahmad Saleh, as well as the experimental animation by Palestinian director and artist Samira Badran.

This selection presents animations by Palestinian animator Ahmad Saleh and the experimental animation by Palestinian visual artist and animator Samira Badran. Ahmad Saleh, born in Saudi Arabia to Palestinian parents, depicts the details and stories that remain with him after each visit to Palestine. He says: "My childhood was marked by a contradiction: a peaceful life with one small window that looked at Palestine through the television screen. As the situation worsened, the window to Palestine grew larger, until it seemed like we were living there every day." Samira Badran, in her works, explores collective memory, confinement, and immobility. In the animation Memory of the Land, she addresses the body pierced by structural and physical violence, which is aggressive, arbitrary, and prevents and attacks its free movement and existence.

https://pekarnamm.org/27390

Films in the program – Animated Palestine:

• Memory of the Land
  Samira Badran, Spain, Palestine, 2017, 13’
  Memory of the Land reflects the human condition under the yoke of different forms of violence, collective memory, and identity as forms of resistance. Palestine. The body is trapped at a checkpoint, a key mechanism of Israeli occupation.

• House
  Ahmad Saleh, Saed Saleh, Saleh Saleh, Halah Saleh, Huda Saleh, and their Mothers, University of Arts Bremen, Germany, Jordan, 2012, 3’50”
  A family of multiple generations lived in a spacious, beautiful, and generous house. The generosity of the house became part of their life. Guests were always welcome to enjoy the pleasant accommodation, until a guest arrived with a different plan.

• My Second Eye
  Ahmad Saleh (Fiction 2.0, Academy of Media Arts Cologne), Germany, Jordan, Palestine, 2016, 11’
  The mothers stood as the war descended upon their homes. The children kept dreaming. The houses grew back. War struck again. The children kept playing. This film won the Student Academy Gold Medal at the International Student Film Competition (also known as the Student Oscars).

• Night
  Ahmad Saleh, Saed Saleh, Saleh Saleh (SES-Studio, Fabian&Fred), Germany, Qatar, Palestine, Jordan, 2021, 15’57”
  The dust of war leaves eyes sleepless. Night brings peace and sleep to everyone in the devastated city, except for the eyes of the mother of a missing child. Night must outwit her to let her sleep, in order to save her soul.