The Docudays UA International Film Festival and the DOCU/CLUB film club network of the Docudays NGO will be presented in the programme of the festival for children and teenagers All Together at Mystetskyi Arsenal on 20–22 September. Let us tell you about the activities that will be waiting for the visitors.

The festival for children and teenagers All Together is a project about learning the diverse experiences of different people through interaction, search, play, and free choice. Every year at Mystetskyi Arsenal, the festival brings together representatives of organisations from all regions of Ukraine that conduct educational activities in the field of culture and creative industries, as well as STEM schools, social initiatives and NGOs, schools and creative studios. This year, for the first time, our festival and the Docudays UA Film Club Network will join it. The programme includes film screenings, quests, the opportunity to try yourself as a director, a film hero or heroine, film awards, and a bright photo zone.

"We want to combine all the artefacts we have left from previous festivals in one concept and put them on our stand at Mystetskyi Arsenal. It will in fact be the backstage world of the festival. All the objects are very different, interactive and fun, and they will tell about our history, the themes of different years, how we plan festivals and design the scenery. There will be two huge fabrics from this year's Docudays UA, which were hanging on the facade of the Zhovten Cinema, also three hypnocalls from 2016, when the festival's theme was 'Through Illusions', two cardboard dogs from the 'State of Emergency' in 2022, when we played on the joke about ‘cinema’ and ‘cynology’ (ed. — the scandal with the Ukrainian State Film Agency) and the sign 'Shchekavytsya, Shchekavytsya, Shchekavytsya' (t/n — a mount in Kyiv, local meme), as well as signs with moving lines ‘Open — Closed’ from the installation by the artist Oleksiy Say, when we reflected on the topic of the digital age together in 2019. We will also showcase our film prizes, which have been collected over the last 5 years of the festival, and catalogues of Ukrainian documentaries. Each award will tell about our collaborations with artists, its own story and concept," opens the curtain of the photo zone Dasha Podoltseva, Docudays UA designer and artist.

Decoration from the 2022 Docudays UA festival. Photo by Stas Kartashov

We invite you to attend film screenings, quests, interactive events, as well as to take pictures against the backdrop of the festival's colourful scenery and hold original film awards, as the winners of the festival do. You will also be able to record a short video message or even a whole interview! The programme of interactive Docudays UA activities also includes a survey on human rights and documentary films on the Mentimeter online platform, a 2–3 minute quiz on human rights, an art exercise called 'We Are All Different', Rights of Children puzzles, and two quests on the topics of diversity and unity. 

Visitors to the Different Together festival will be able to watch three short films. On 20 September 2024, at 15:00–16:30, there will be a screening and discussion of the film Gabriel Reports on the World Cup (dir. Els van Driel, the Netherlands) moderated by Nataliya Dobrianska, a teacher, a consultant at the Lviv Professional Development Centre for Teachers from the DOCU/CLUB Network. And on 22 September, at 17:30–19:00, we will screen the films of the Civil Pitch 2.0 project Under the Wing of a Night and Our Robo Family with the participation of the director Anastasiya Tykhaya and the team of the Docudays UA International Film Festival.

"Participation in the festival is very important for the DOCU/CLUB Network, because it is a great opportunity to tell teenagers, their parents, and educators about the importance of documentary films for understanding themselves and others, the diversity of the world, learning about their rights and how to protect them. We want to tell modern schoolchildren that documentary cinema is cool, and that film clubs in schools are fun, informative and inspiring. And that we are open to cooperation and ready to share with you film masterpieces, classroom discussion scripts for films and help you develop your film clubs," says Nina Khoma, the head of the DOCU/CLUB Network. 

The stand will have an information point where everyone will be able to learn about the opportunities offered by the Docudays UA team for educators, teenagers and young people, namely about the DOCU/CLUB Network: how to register your own Docudays UA film club, apply to participate in the school DOCU/WEEK, create school clubs and electives using documentary films. You will also have the opportunity to learn more about the Docudays UA International Festival, including volunteering at the International Festival, the student jury, the Travelling Festival in the regions, the DOCUSPACE online cinema, and the Ukraine War Archive project.

We invite you to attend the All Together festival with your family and friends in September. Tickets and abonements are available here, and you will be able to watch online broadcasts of the most interesting activities on our Docudays UA social media channels.