Cinema workshop in center MIR, Faculty (Fakulteta) Quarter, Sofia city

12 young people from Faculteta Quarter in Sofia city participated in a cinema workshop with Alberto Redighieri from Italy. Our hosts from HESED – Health and Social Development Foundation invited boys and girls from the Roma community they had been working with for years. The only condition was to be interested in video recording and production.

The daily use of smartphones and the presence of screens on tablets and computers in everyday life convey information, messages and emotions with filters for visual communication. They create a historical context in which we see the increasing importance of understanding what a moving image is today, understanding the techniques, the language of the visual image itself, and above all, knowing how to express ourselves through it. It is only through a historical and social understanding that the new generations come into contact with the living matter of what moving images – cinema, television, the Internet, social networks, smartphones, want to tell us. So it’s time to learn to speak, to express what we feel, through the language of cinema.’’ – shares Alberto Redighieri.

Within 3 days the participants were introduced to the language of moving images, talked about their technical characteristics and philosophy, about today’s world and the reflection that the world of screens gives us. The cinema workshop ended with the production of short videos from the participants and a request for their meetings to continue.

Alberto Redighieri is a filmmaker who graduated in Italy. He is an author of several documentaries, independent productions, participating in European Documentary Film Festivals. Alberto is in Bulgaria with the support of the European Commission’s Erasmus + program and is interviewing the participants in the projects of  Open Space Foundation.

In November we will see his view on eco-campaigns organized by young people  in Sofia in support of the #FridayForFuture movement launched in Sweden at the initiative of 12-year-old Greta Thunberg. The exhibition will be at the Lovers Bridge behind the National Palace of Culture and will present portraits of the participants.