Created under the patronage of the National University of Theatre and Film “I.L. Caragiale” and theNational University of Arts Bucharest, with the support of the Romanian National Cinema Centre, BUCHAREST INTERNATIONAL EXPERIMENTAL FILM FESTIVAL BIEFF has as its main focus the courage to experiment in cinematic language.

BIEFF is the first showcase of avant-garde cinema and visual art in Romania, a non-commercial event witheducational purpose, aimed at bringing in front of the audience highly innovative films and filmmakers with strong personal views on contemporary reality, which also daringly explore the boundaries of cinematic language. A cinema of total creative freedom and lack of compromise. 

BIEFF is also the first event in Romania dedicated to promoting the border area between cinema and visual art, offering increased visibility to cutting edge visual artists, whose work is mainly accessible in museums and in the art gallery circuit and rarely on cinema screen. We do this because we believe this border area is an extremely rich, creatively nourishing territory, from where unique artistic voices have constantly emerged over the years, such as Peter Greenaway, David Lynch, Derek Jarman, Andy Warhol, Stan Brakhage etc.

BIEFF presents on one side an INTERNATIONAL EXPERIMENTAL SHORT FILM COMPETITION, consisting of some of the most intriguing and innovative visual experiments from the last few years, titles awarded and screened in prestigious festivals, museums and galleries all over the world, such as Cannes, Berlin, Venice, Rotterdam, Oberhausen, Centre Pompidou etc.

BIEFF is also honored to collaborate with some of the major international film festivals and institutions in the area of avant-garde cinema and visual art, recognized worldwide for their consistent creative support of innovative, radical filmmaking and visual art: QUINZAINE DESRÉALISATEURS - Cannes Film Festival, OBERHAUSEN International Short Film Festival, IDFA International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam, Centre POMPIDOU Paris, Le FRESNOY – Studio National des Arts Contemporains, EYE Film Institute Netherlands, SIXPACKFILM Austria,each of them bringing to Bucharest a selection of highly innovative multi-awarded films from their last year’s selections. We also started, in 2012, a long-term partnership with MNAC National Museum of Contemporary Art Bucharest.

We are honored to welcome in our INTERNATIONAL COMPETITION JURY prestigious films professionals such as: Rémi Bonhomme (Program Manager - Semaine de la Critique, Cannes Film Festival), Joost Daamen (Programmer - IDFA Amsterdam), Mario Micaelo (Director - Curtas Vila do Conde International Short Film Festival), Mieke Bernink (Head of the Film Master of the National Film and Television Academy Amsterdam) and Andrei Rus (Romanian film critic and professor at the National University of Theatre and Film Bucharest).

As well, BIEFF started in 2010 a wonderful collaboration with one of the leading experimental filmmakers of our time, PETER GREENAWAY. He opened our festival in 2010 with an impressive Masterclass, addressed especially to our main audience, Romanian film and visual art students and professionals, and in 2011, with his groundbreaking LIVE CINEMA VJ PERFORMANCE LUPERCYCLOPEDIA, a highly innovative audio-visual experiment, intended to challenge the borders of filmic language and offer the audience a totally new cinematic experience, performance which was immensely successful all over the world, traveling in only 4 years to 14 countries: Australia, Belgium, Brazil, France, Germany, Italy, Mexico, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Russia, Spain, Switzerland and the UK. In 2012, we closed our festival with the Romanian premiere of his impressive latest feature, GOLTZIUS AND THE PELICAN COMPANY.

 

Starting with 2012, PETER GREENAWAY became the HONORARY PRESIDENT of the Bucharest International Experimental Film Festival BIEFF, generously joining us in our educational initiative. PETER GREENAWAY is one of the key voices of contemporary avant-garde cinema, one of the most ambitious and controversial experimental filmmakers of our time. Trained as a painter and heavily influenced by theories of structural linguistics, ethnography, and philosophy, PETER GREENAWAY's films often traverse unexplored territories, rejecting conventional narrative structures in favor of awe-striking imagery, constantly testing the limits of the cinematic medium. Regularly nominated in prestigious film festivals such as Cannes, Venice and Berlin, he has an impressive body of work, consisting of 13 feature films and 50 short films and documentaries, plus exhibitions, visual installations, VJ performances, paintings, books, opera librettos.

Also, following its previous years' success, BIEFF will dedicate again its 2013 Opening and Closing Ceremonies to the most recent works of some major names of the contemporary cinema. In 2010, BIEFFpresented, for the first time in Romania, the latest film of the master of experimental cinema Jan Švankmajer, right after its premiere in Venice. In 2011, BIEFF screened the Romanian premiere of the most recent work of Alexander Sokurov, his impressive FAUST, winner of the Golden Lion in Venice 2011.

 

Copel Moscu, Festival Director

Adina Pintilie, Curator of the International Programme