The Venice Film Festival will host a Ukrainian Day on Sept. 6 with a series of panels and meetings to support war-torn Ukraine and its film industry.
With this event, which follows an analogous initiative on the Lido last year, the fest’s parent organisation, the Venice Biennale foundation, “Reaffirms its solidarity with the Ukrainian people and the tragedy they are experiencing.” It segues from similar initiatives to support Ukraine organised by the Biennale during its visual arts and architecture sections.
The Venice fest’s Ukrainian Day will be held at the Venice Production Bridge’s Spazio Incontri at the Hotel Excelsior. It will include an introduction by the president of the Biennale, Roberto Cicutto, and artistic director Alberto Barbera.
The first panel will be titled “The Ukrainian Film Industry During the War” and feature a presentation of the state of affairs by Marina Kuderchuk, head of Ukraine’s state agency for cinema.
It will be followed by another panel titled “Filming With Ukraine: Support and Cooperation” and feature several producers: Artem Kolyubaev, who is chief of the country’s cinematography council; Viktoria Yarmoshchuk, who heads the Ukrainian motion picture association; Serhiy Lavrenyuk, who heads the Ukrainian film industry association; Andriy Nogin who, besides being a producer, leads the NGO UkrKinoFest; and director Philippe Azoulay. Both panels will be moderated by Volodymyr Ostapchuk who is an actor, producer and Ukrainan TV personality.
Premiering in Venice’s Horizons Extra section this year is “Forever-Forever” (“Nazavzhdy-Nazavzhdy”) by Ukrainian first time director Anna Buryachkova which completed principal photography in Kyiv just two months before the city faced Russia’s full-scale attack war against Ukraine.
Venice’s upcoming 80th edition runs Aug. 30-Sept. 9.
