Ars Independent

We still have a year to the next edition of the multimedia festival Ars Independent, but as of today, films, animations, music videos and video games can be submitted for the Black Horse competitions. This year’s call for entries ends on April 26th.

Ars Independent 2019 will take place between September 24th and 29th in Katowice. AS every year, the festival is searching for what’s cool in young, debuting, contemporary audio-visual culture. It’s not afraid to watch videos with 27 views on YouTube, it’s missing the “least popular” sorting option on itch.io and considers Festival Scope Pro decidedly “too mainstream.” Over 6 autumn days we will experience: screenings of films, animations and music videos, video game, VR and new technologies exhibitions, concerts and interdisciplinary performances. In first programme reveals will arrive in May – at the same time, pre-orders for festival passes will begin.

At the heart of the event are four international competitions for new works (2018/2019). In the Black Horse of Film, directors of feature films will compete. Short animations will clash in the Black Horse of Animation. The Black Horse of Video Games and the Black Horse of Music Videos are dedicated to authors of new games and music videos.

In all fields, the creators compete for the title and statue of the Black Horse as well as a monetary prize of 500 euros, awarded by the festival audience.

“It’s not ashamed of its mistakes, has the courage to tackle hard and unobvious topics. It knows, that it’s not for everyone and it seems that this is what makes it the dark horse among festivals. Let’s hope it will still gallop bravely, because we’re already reserving a week in September 2019. And you?” wrote Agnieszka Karpiel in a feature after the festival for “Reflektor.”

The nominees will be announced on August 26th alongside the festival’s full programme.

Rules and regulations as well as entry forms can be found at: arsindependent.pl.