The seventh edition of La Guarimba International Film Festival brought to Amantea, from 7 to 11 August featured five days of cinema, music, an exhibition of illustrations, workshops, workshops for children and conferences for the emerging film industry, confirming its mission of democratization, integration and accessibility of culture.

This year the festival was the only southern destination selected for the International Year of UNESCO Indigenous Languages and was able to count on the support of Regione Calabria, the Mibac (Italian Ministry of Culture), the Embassy of the United States, Embassy of Hungary, Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany, Embassy of Canada, General Representation of the Flemish Community and the Region of Flanders.

La Guarimba has acquired national and international sponsors, such as MINI Italia, G-Technology and Klean Kanteen, and has confirmed local sponsorships that have been investing in the project for years with the aim of enhancing the territory, such as the Fichi Marano company, Grafiche Calabria and the Conad of Campora San Giovanni.

We registered 101 guests, among directors and industry members. More than 5000 people in the audience for the films in competition, the out of competition programmes, the children program, the workshops, the masterclass and the conferences.

The Festival has become a member of the Short Film Conference, an organization for the promotion of short films. The official selection has screened 152 short films from 42 nations divided into six categories in the competition: Fiction, Documentary, Animation, Video clips, Experimental Films and La Grotta dei Piccoli. To these, four additional programs were featured out of competition: a selection of short films made thanks to Migrarti; the section of African shorts “Karmala” and US short “Americania“.

The sustainability project CAMBUR, inaugurated in 2018, this year has not only helped us eliminate the use of plastic, but has proved to be economically beneficial. In fact, there are many companies that have supported us in an attempt to reduce our environmental impact, such as Klean Kanteen, Who Gives A Crap, Green Gate bio packaging, Mabboo, and Kabloom. On August 6th, thanks to the collaboration with the American Movement Parley, we included our guests and the whole town in cleaning the Amantea beach, managing to collect 310kg of garbage: Plastic: 80kg, Non-recyclable: 230kg (of which metals: 150).

During the days of the festival, the Maria Degtiarenko from the United States was one of our artists in residence with PANS her photographic project which consists in a series of panoramic photos of the festival.

The illustration workshop for children “Mamma voglio fare l’artista” (Mum, I want to be an artist), curated by Sara Fratini and Mikel Murillo, took place at Parco La Grotta on August 7th, involving 85 children of all ages and introduced the space dedicated to children.

La Grotta dei piccoli, has reached its fourth edition, proposing a program of eighty animated short films realized with the collaboration of UNICEF Italy, with the aim of showing the new generations cultural works otherwise unknown. Within this category, we have created an environmentally-themed selection, inspired by our sustainability project Cambur, where we try to communicate delicate messages and topics, such as the relationship between man and nature, through the simplicity of animated cinema.

Opening the festival on August 7th was, like every year, the Orchestra di Fiati Mediterranea Città di Amantea with a Guarimbero-themed concert. Next, the two opening films: “Il Mondo Trovato” by Vincent Moon and “Should I stay or should I go”.

Due to its success last year, the selection of experimental films in the “Insomnia” competition were screened at 3am at the Lido Carioca in Amantea. The event was sponsored by G-Technology. This year the opening concert was by N.A.I.P. (acronym of “No Artist in Particular”), a new Italian musical project curated by Mamma Dischi.

The “Natural Dyes” workshop curated by the New York based Studio Fragmentario was held on August 8th before the screenings, in collaboration with Azienda Agricola Russo. The workshop taught participants how to dye different clothing materials with the skin of the Tropea Onion, famous in all of Italy and cultivated in the area of Amantea.

As always, the association Auser in Amantea welcomed all the Guarimberos for a social lunch that combined Calabrian food, wine, traditional and Senegalese music.

During the second day of the festival, a meeting on the beach was organized for an informal chat about the identity of the festival. “Chat on the beach” was held directly in the water, where directors, programmers, staff and guests discussed the work and the ideas behind La Guarimba.

La Guarimba has led, like every year, a guided tour of the historical centre of Amantea, an opportunity for guests, volunteers and the whole Guarimbero family to get together, explore and learn about the town.

The program of conferences dedicated to the emerging film industry has been enriched this year with numerous talks open to the public and to our guests, accompanied by an aperitif offered by the restaurant Tipiko. The focus on Animation Films was highlighted by the conference “Women in Animation“, which hosted Jeanette Bonds (United States, Glas Animation), Keltie Duncan (Canada, Ottawa International Animation Festival), Éva Katinka Bognár (Hungary, MOME) and Luce Grosjean (France, Miyu Distribution) moderated by Sara Fratini (Italy, La Guarimba).

The talk on “Cultural Impact” highlighted the importance that culture exerts on the territory as an opportunity to enhance places, and has seen the confrontation of different national and international experiences, thanks to the contributions of Sara Cecconi (Italy, Piccolo Cinema America), Ivan Arella (Italy, Cleto Festival), Keba Danso (Senegal, Karmala Cultura) and Edo Wulia (Indonesia, Minikino).

The American director Kristian Mercado, in competition with the music video Pa’lante, gave a video conference where he talked about the creative process that accompanied the creation of the three video clips for the electropop artist Billie Eilish.

Our head of subtitling Marta Miquel shared with the audience of La Guarimba some tips on how to approach the making of subtitles in short films, while Sarah Fallert of PicturePipe presented the European project of AVA Library, of which we are partners.

On August 10th at 5pm at the Chiesa Madre San Biagio, we screened the MigrArti program, introduced by Paolo Masini, creator of the project, transforming the church into a Cinema for a couple of hours.

On August 11th, in collaboration with the Scuola Holden, Daniele De Cicco held a corporate storytelling workshop for cultural operators entitled “An effective presentation: the pitch” at the Hotel Mediterraneo.

Calabrese singer-songwriter Brunori SAS came to say hello during this edition, he talked about being Calabrese and presented one of the selections with us.

Jacinta Agten, Flemish director trained at the LUCA School of Arts, participated first as programmer of the festival, curating the Documentary section, and also participated as a guest of the film residency that La Guarimba organizes each year, inviting a director to produce and shoot a film at Amantea, during the festival.

Gema Hernández, Spanish photographer was our artist-in-residency with a portraits project to tell the story of our team with her lens. A residency in collaboration with Karmala Cultura.

The last day of screenings showed the public three out of competitions programs: a selection of shorts from sub-Saharan Africa curated by Karmala Cultura; the program of American shorts “Americania“, curated by Sam Morrill; and finally the short film “Una tradizione di famiglia” (A family tradition) by Giusepe Cardaci produced by MINI FILMLAB, a project carried out by MINI ITALIA and OffiCine.

At the end of the festival, a concert was held by Abass Ndiaye, a Senegalese musician, composer and singer who lives in Berlin, who accompanied the evening with a mix of Afro Pop, Folk, Reggae, Hiphop and Afro Beat sounds.

Like last year, La Guarimba asked 15 international illustrators to create a poster for the event, reinterpreting the Guarimbero monkey in their own style and in their own language.

K2rte (Estonia), Catalina Cartagena (Chile), Julia Rose Barnes (United States), Mikel Murillo (Spain), Jisu Choi (South Korea), Julie Caty (France), Tyler Gross (United States), Felilustra (Venezuela ), Ruan Van Vliet (Ireland), Adam Higton (United Kingdom), Clara Selina Bach (Denmark), Paula Sosa Holt (Argentina), Camille De Cussac (France), Jenny Jokela (Finland), Luca Tóth (Hungary) the the artists involved in this edition of “Artists for La Guarimba”.

The works were exhibited during the days of the festival in an exhibition curated by the artist Sara Fratini.

THE JURY 2019

La Guarimba 2019 jury was totally female, implementing the strategies carried out by international institutions such as Eurimages, which since 2015 has developed the special program “Aiming for 50/50”, with the aim of promoting gender equality in the movie industry.

Jeanette Bonds (United States), founder and director of GLAS Animation Festival in California. Éva Katinka Bógnar (Hungary), animation director and lecturer at the prestigious Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design in Budapest (MOME). Norma Guevara (Cuba / France), responsible of programming the Films de Femmes in Créteil and founder of the Women Film Festival Network.

ARTISTS FOR LA GUARIMBA 2019

15 Artists. 1 Monkey. An illustration exhibition. Curated by Sara Fratini.

THE JURY 2019

Norma Guevara (Cuba/France) head programmer at Films de Femmes of Créteil and founder of the Women Film Festival Network.

Éva Katinka Bognár (Hungary) animator and professor at the prestigious Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design di Budapest (MOME)

Jeanette Bonds (USA) the writer, animator founder and director of GLAS Animation Festival in California

I VINCITORI 2019

MEDIA 2019