Main International jury - International competition
KRZYSZTOF ZANUSSI - President
Krzysztof Zanussi is a film director, producer and scriptwriter. Director of many award-winning, internationally acclaimed films (awarded in Cannes, Venice, Locarno, Moscow, Chicago, Montreal, Berlin, Tokio): The Structure of Crystal (1968), Illumination (1973), Camouflage (1976), Constant Factor (1980), The Year of Quiet Sun (1984), Wherever You Are If You Are (1988), In Full Gallop (1996), Persona Non Grata (2004), Revisited (2009), Foreign Body (2014). Krzysztof Zanussi is also a theatre director staging productions all around the world. He has authored several books. Has honorary doctorate of many renowned universities and gives lectures all around the world.
At the end of the 1980s, he co-founded the European Film Academy with Ingmar Bergman which convoked him in the first nucleous of one hundred members. Subsequently, Zanussi left the academy not agreeing with its development as an elitarian club. By the end of the 2000s, Zanussi took part again with the activities and the expansion of the community to around 1.000 members.
President of Tor Film Production, producer of the films by Krzysztof Kieślowski, Agnieszka Holland and many others. Professor at Silesian University in Katowice (Poland).
KEREM AYAN - Jury member
Kerem Ayan has been born in Istanbul. He studied Mechanical Engineering at the Yildiz Technical University, Istanbul. Ayan moved to Paris in 1992 and studied film at the Ecole Supérieure de Réalisation Audiovisuelle and Université Paris Diderot - Paris 7. He was the Assistant Director and in charge of the cultural page in the Radio France International for four years. Ayan started working for the Cannes Film Festival in 2001 and meanwhile, organized the International Literary Adaptation Market in Monaco. In 2005, he launched the Political Films Festival in Barcelona and directed it for three years. He became Director of the Istanbul Film Festival in 2015 where he worked as Assistant Director 2006 onwards. Kerem Ayan has been directing plays since 2010 and has so far staged Mr. Nobody (2010-2011); Chien-chien by Fabrice Roger-Lacan (2012-13), The Labor of Life by Hanoch Levin (2013-2018), The City For One by Behiç Ak (2014-15), and Anayurt
Hotel–Zebercet by Yusuf Atılgan (2018- 2019). He has wrote and directed the short film Fishbone in 2017.
DRAGOMIR SHOLEV - Jury member
Dragomir Sholev was born in 1977 in Ruse, Bulgaria. In 2005 he graduated at the National Academy of Theater and Film Arts "Krsto Sarafov", in the department of film, animation and TV directing.
Since 2003 he has been working as an assistant director on more than 50 commercials produced by Zografik Film. He has directed more than 40 commercials and promotional videos for companies such as Globul, B-Connect, Cinema, Sofia Film Festival, and has made numerous short films that have won significant awards at festivals around the world.
In 2010, he shot "Shelter", his feature debut film, for which he is co-writer with the proven Romanian screenwriter Razvan
Radulescu. The film has taken part in major film festivals around the world, such as the San Sebastian International Film Festival, the official awards selection, the Odessa Film Festival and many others, and has been awarded for Best Bulgarian Film in 2011. In 2019, he decided to produce his second feature film "Pig" on his own, and is currently working on a post-production of his latest, third film
"Fish Bone".
Dragomir Sholev has been repeatedly awarded for his work as a director with the awards for best director at the Bratislava
International Film Festival, then with the New Visions Award at the Manaki Brothers International Film Festival and others.
Short film jury
ALEN DRLJEVIC - President
Alen Drljević was born in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina. He graduated from the Academy of Performing Arts in Sarajevo in 2005. His first film Prva plata (Paycheck) was nominated for the European Film Academy Award for Best Short Film. His debut feature documentary KARNEVAL (Carnival) at the world’s most significant documentary film festival IDFA was featured in two competitive selections, First Appearance and Movies that Matter. The debut feature film Muškarci ne plaču (Men Don’t Cry) was premiered at the Karlovy Vary Film Festival’s Main Competition Program, where it won two awards. Subsequently, the film was screened at dozens of international film festivals and won more than twenty awards, including the one at the International Film Festival Kinenova in Skopje 2017 for best director.
ANA DISHLIESKA-MITOVA - Jury member
Ana Dishlieska-Mitova completed her undergraduate studies at the Institute of Philosophy at the Faculty of Philosophy in Skopje, but found herself in love with film, somewhere at the crossroads between the seventh art and philosophy. In 2010 she founded the Philosophical Film Festival in Skopje and leads it for ten years, as program director of the Festival which is the only specialized festival of this type and with this volume in the world. She has participated in numerous national and European projects, trainings, workshops and conferences in the field of philosophy and film, and has participated in projects in Skopje, Lisbon and Luxembourg where she currently lives. In Luxembourg she has been working for five years as a project coordinator of
CinEast - Central and Eastern European Film Festival in the field of programming and production. He has been
collaborating with the Luxembourg City Film Festival, the largest film festival in Luxembourg, for three years now. In addition to film festivals, she is dedicated to work in the field of publishing, as a member of the editorial board of the magazine Philosophical Tribune (there has been published two editions of the magazine in the field of film and philosophy in Macedonia), subtitles (Imagining Peace - Dialogue for Perception).
Currently she has been working on her first book.
STEFAN ARSENIJEVIC - Jury member
Born in Belgrade in 1977.
Graduated Film and TV Directing from the Faculty of Dramatic Arts in Belgrade, where he now teaches film directing at the Master studies.
For his short films won over 30 national and international awards, including Golden Bear at Berlinale, European Film Academy Award and nomination for the Oscar.
His first feature "Love and Other Crimes" premiered at Berlinale in 2008 and won several awards at the international festivals.
Program manager of Goethe-Institut’s professional training program for Southeast European film directors FIRST FILMS FIRST since 2015.
