Architecture 20. MFDF Ji.hlava

Last night, we completed the first phase of this year's architecture of the documentary film festival in Jihlava. Four days of work in the structure of a spatial grid. The result is a "super shelf" in Jihlava's Masaryk Square, which allows you to climb, walk across a bridge, and again experience the extraordinary horizon of everyday life. Above all, however, this year's 20th edition of the festival, 14 days before its start, invites citizens and subsequently the festival guests to deposit the burdens of the past into the shelves of the shelf. Unneeded items that may still serve others, or for a moment become artifacts. Will the shelf become a dump? Will people participate? We shall see. It is a social experiment. If it fails, a beautiful monumental structure will still remain in the square. Additional smaller shelves will spring up at many locations in Jihlava just before the festival starts on October 25, 2016.

An exhibition on the 20th anniversary of the International Documentary Film Festival Ji.hlava has been accessible since Friday, October 14, 2016, in Masaryk Square in the center of Jihlava. It reminds the city's residents, tourists, and festival visitors of its twenty-year history and brings the phenomenon of documentary filmmaking closer.
“The MFDF Ji.hlava has long been among the most significant cultural events in the regional city and the entire region. With this exhibition project, we want to invite new audiences and show what makes the Jihlava festival exceptional. In our opinion, this is the active effort to improve the environment – and it is equally important whether it concerns the urban environment, the filmmaking environment, or awareness and knowledge about documentary creation. This comprehensive approach, consistently applied over the long term, is the key to the interest and respect that, to our joy, the festival enjoys,” sums up festival director Marek Hovorka.
The festival exhibition Ji.hlava 20 presents artifacts of various sizes and shapes closely connected to some of the past festival editions of MFDF Ji.hlava. Interested visitors will see the first printed catalog from 1997, festival awards created by Petr Nikl or Krištof Kintera, or festival accreditations from leading Czech directors.
“Summarizing twenty years in a few texts and photographs is actually impossible. The exhibition is primarily an invitation to the surprising world of documentary films and a prompt for a festival experience. The exceptional atmosphere and unique opportunity to see films that come to the Czech Republic mostly for the first time and often for a long time last time make the Ji.hlava projections a significant event. The festival atmosphere impressed the legend of Portuguese cinema Manoel de Oliveira ten years ago, who called Ji.hlava the ‘Mecca of documentary film’.”
The exhibition celebrating twenty years of the festival is divided into four parts. Each part addresses one possible perspective on the festival: it presents the most significant guests, highlights the exceptional artistic and architectural concept, emphasizes its publishing and distribution activities, and underscores its natural rooting in Jihlava.
The Ji.hlava 20 exhibition is installed in four glass City modules by KOMA Modular, which last year built the Czech pavilion at the Expo in Milan, Italy. A significant place is also the so-called Lighthouse, where festival visitors can pick up their visitor accreditations every day, including weekends, from October 14, between 9 AM and 5 PM until the first day of the festival, when the accreditation distribution will move to the traditional location of the Vysočina Regional Gallery. Among those giving out accreditations will be members of the festival staff. So if festival visitors are lucky, they will receive their accreditation from festival director Marek Hovorka, executive director Katarína Holubcová, or the head of programming or production.
During the festival, the Lighthouse will function as a meeting place for film professionals to gather and discuss their projects, festival events, and forge important partnerships for their future professional work. Part of the Lighthouse will also be Café Fond, which is under the auspices of the State Fund of Cinematography.
The jubilee 20th edition of MFDF Ji.hlava, through its artistic concept, designed again by leading graphic designer Juraj Horváth, poses the question – What do we carry on our backs? Festival architects Vít Šimek and Josef Čančík add in one breath: “What we no longer need, let us place on the prepared shelves and give to others. Perhaps we will also discover something for ourselves.”
Thus, everyone who has unnecessary items lying around in the attic, basement, home, or garden can bring them to the prepared wooden structures resembling shelves and racks. Unneeded items can well serve someone else or temporarily become a valuable artifact and a part of the 20th edition of MFDF Ji.hlava. “Will the shelf become a dump? Will people participate? We shall see. It is a social experiment,” the duo of architects adds.
You will find the largest festival super shelf in Masaryk Square right in the center of Jihlava. Smaller shelves will be placed in front of each festival cinema during MFDF Ji.hlava, replacing last year’s fire pits.