How do you navigate from the nuclear family to the end of the world? The short animation films in this year’s competition go all the way to show us both our smaller and larger world with a new pair of eyes (and eyeglasses). Sometimes they are too daring, talking about our post-survival world in just a few minutes and in black-and-white; at other times, they are too funny, reminding us that art and the artists themselves are not hidden behind a beautiful content, but they are people with flesh and blood – and they need themselves to survive. Curious, energetic, complex but relatable, aesthetically diverse, they may fall into coming-of-age stories, stories of relationships, social responsibility, politics and democracy, or simply the absurd and the unexpected. The interplay between reality and abstraction holds strong; also the quest for our own personal truth (never a conventional one), entails a lot of eccentric but well-targeted episodes along the way. Enjoy!

Vassilis Kroustallis