MIOB New Vision Award 2023 goes to Icelandic Beautiful Beings
OPEN CALL | LAB OF FESTIVAL JOURNALISM | Extended

3rd LAB of Cultural, Creative and Festival Journalism is an initiative organised by the European Festival Network MIOB. It is a project financed jointly by the European Union within the framework of Film Festivals networks action and it is free for the selected grant-holders.

Applications extended to the 8th October, 2023.

We are convinced that the quality cinema, the cinema in which we believe in and that we promote, should be appreciated through analysis, thought and discussion. Auteur cinema cannot be understood without film criticism and cinema journalism, since these genres have systematically contributed to highlighting and understanding the constant changes of cinematographic art. Despite the difficult moment that cinema journalism is going through, we are aware that there is a new generation of critics and cinema journalists who have their own way of writing and expressing themselves in a totally different way than their senior colleagues. By doing this, we would like to promote these new voices, offering them the opportunity to attend European events. As festivals, we also need the talented people we bring to our cities to express themselves and have visibility in the traditional media and on the Internet. The main goal is to promote the training of journalists specialised in culture, who can benefit from tutored, tailor-made training with top-level specialists in cultural journalism and who can experience field work at a film festival. It is a unique and concrete opportunity to support future cultural journalists.

We are looking for up to 18 young Europeans who are keen to learn journalistic resources focused on the cultural field, especially cinema. This lab combines online training, with 4 previous training sessions and face-to-face practical training at the Seville European Film Festival or European Film Forum Scanorama, Les Arcs Film Festival and Trieste Film Festival.

The selected participants will create content for the festivals and for MIOB websites, with interviews to film crews, articles and any other proposal the festival or the selected candidates may have. The articles, once their quality standards are reviewed, will be uploaded to the attended festival website and to the MIOB website. 3rd Young Cultural Journalists LAB will cover the costs of travel, accommodation, subsistence allowance and festival accreditation, thanks to the Creative Europe Media Programme grant.

Participants will be required to attend both parts of the lab:

ONLINE TRAINING

4 preparatory online sessions with top-level experts in European cultural journalism (empathic interview, the creative critic, the documented article and report, digital and audiovisual journalism, press department work, etc.) in early November.

ON-SITE TRAINING

Participants will be divided into 3 groups of a maximum 6 persons to ensure fulfilling practice. Each group will attend one film festival:

21st European Film Forum Scanorama (Lithuania): 6 days, 5 nights between 9 - 19 November 2023 or 20th Seville European Film Festival (Spain): 4 days, 3 nights last week of November 2023;
15th Les Arcs Film Festival (France): 6 days, 5 nights between 16 - 23 December 2023;
35th Trieste Film Festival (Italy): 6 days, 5 nights between 23 - 28 January 2024.

Registration is free.

REQUIREMENTS
● Under 32 years old;
● Passion about cinema and culture;
● A university degree or a university student;
● Proficient in written and spoken English;
● Provable experience of cultural articles, especially film-related articles in any format: print, video, audio or online media or other creative form of a daily report or Q&A events.

REQUIRED DOCUMENTS
● Motivational letter
● Current CV (in English)
● Three samples of recent work (written, audio or video);
● Recommendation letter from an institution of studies, work or collaboration (company, university, festival, cultural institution or association), if applicable.

Selected participants will be notified on 31 October 2023.

Recent collaborators: Alfonso Rivera (Cineuropa), Marta Balaga (Cineuropa), Vladan Petkovic (Screendaily), Tom C. Avendaño (Icon-El País), Sebas Alonso (Jenesaispop).

The selection will be made by a committee that will include the lab coordinator, journalists, and a representative of each festival (Seville / Scanorama, Les Arcs and Trieste).

Open call is valid until 5th of October: APPLICATION FORM