The graduation films "Crevette" (Bachelor Animation) and "Sarrebe Statu" (Bachelor Video) received awards at the Solothurn Film Festival. "Crevette" was also nominated for the best graduation film at the Swiss Film Awards.
"Crevette"
by Jill Vágner (Zurich ZH), Elina Huber (Zumikon ZH), Noémi Knobil (Lausanne VD), Sven Bachmann (Riehen BS)
The five-minute 2D animated film received the Audience Award for Best Animated Film at the 59th Solothurn Film Festival (January 17 to 24, 2024) today. The award is endowed with 10,000 francs. During the Film Festival, "Crevette" was also nominated for the Swiss Film Award (March 18-24, 2024) in the Best Graduation Film category.
"Crevette" was created in 2023 in Bachelor Animation: protagonist Jeanie discovers the eponymous "crevette" in her frozen fridge. The animal transforms into a human embryo before Jeanie’s eyes - a symbol of the young woman’s unconscious fear of pregnancy...
The film has already won several awards, including at the Fantoche animation film festival and the Canton of Lucerne’s ST.ART prize for young talent.
"Sarrebe Statu"
by Ella Rocca (Wettswil ZH)
Ella Rocca’s graduation film Sarebbe Statu in the Bachelor Video (2023) was awarded the Suissimage/SSA Young Talent Award at the 59th Solothurn Film Festival. The prize is endowed with CHF 10,000. It is awarded to film students.
Sarebbe Statu is an autobiographical film about one’s own roots, being queer, longings and losses. The 14-minute documentary revolves around the apartment above Ella Rocca’s grandparents’ house in southern Italy, which was started but never finished. Ella visits the shell of the building and reflects on what might have been if the director had grown up there instead of in Switzerland: "If there was a window here, you could see the sea."
Film studies at the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts
The HSLU’s Department of Design Film Art offers three-year Bachelor’s programs in film:
- It focuses on the genres of documentary film and video essay. Students are encouraged to develop their own film language and a love of experimentation.
In Bachelor Animation, students learn to design and realize animation projects - whether drawn by hand, narrated using stop-motion or animated on the computer.
Graduates of the two Bachelor’s programs go on to deepen their skills in storytelling or animation in the Master Film or Master Animation. The course lasts four semesters.
Films from the HSLU are regularly selected for the wreaths at major film festivals. A small selection:
- ’Ours’ (Bachelor Video): Oscar shortlist 2024, Best Graduation Film Swiss Film Award 2023
- ’All cats are gray at night’ (Bachelor Video): European Film Award 2020
- ’The Edge ’ (Master Film): New Swiss Talent at the Fantoche 2020 animated film festival
- ’Mama Rosa ’ (Bachelor Video): Best Newcomer Film at the Locarno Film Festival 2019
HSLU was also accepted by the international film school association CILECT in 2023 and was named the best educational institution in the field of animation at the renowned animated film festival Animafest Zagreb in 2021.
