The Museum of Civilian Voices of the Rinat Akhmetov Foundation Became a Partner of the Odesa International Film Festival

The Odesa International Film Festival (OIFF) is the main national cinema festival of Ukraine and one of the largest events for cinema audiences in Eastern Europe. This year, the event will be held from 19 to 26 August 2023. The Museum of Civilian Voices of the Rinat Akhmetov Foundation acts as a Partner of the Film Industry Office documentary section of the OIFF.

With the support of the Museum, a series of panel discussions and round tables will be held in the framework of the documentary section. The events will bring together international and Ukrainian speakers and will touch upon some important topics especially acute during the wartime — the ethics of documentary filmmaking, its place in the development of social institutions, and the internationalization of documentary filmmaking.

In addition, the documentary film Dram about the shelter of the Drama Theatre in Mariupol, directed and produced by Yulian Ulybin, will be shown as part of the Odesa International Film Festival. This film was created in cooperation with the Museum of Civilian Voices of the Rinat Akhmetov Foundation.

Based on the results of the presented selection program of the 14th OIFF, the winner in the category Best Documentary Feature will receive a special award from the Museum.

The Museum of Civilian Voices collects and stores the stories from Ukrainian civilians about their experiences during the war. Its archive now has more than 78,000 such stories. Each of them is about somebody’s fate, told first-hand, about living emotions and memories.

Documentary films are another effective and graphic way to capture and tell the world about what Ukrainians live through. This is a joint mission, in the framework of which the Museum actively supports documentary cinema in Ukraine and the world, conducts and supports some thematic events, and shares the stories collected in its archive as a basis for film plots.

All the stories are available for watching, listening and reading on the portal of the Museum of Civilian Voices of the Rinat Akhmetov Foundation.