Open City Documentary Festival
@opencitydocs.bsky.social
Celebrating the Art of Non-Fiction 16th edition: 14-19 April 2026 at venues across London opencitylondon.com
We are delighted to announce the participants of the Open City x Another Gaze (@another-gaze.bsky.social) Critics Workshop! 🖊️ Led by Daniella Shreir (@shreir.bsky.social) and Laura Staab (@laurastaab.bsky.social). Meet this year’s cohort here✨: opencitylondon.com/news/open-ci...
Open City x Another Gaze - Announcing participants of the Critics Workshop 2026 - Open City Documentary Festival
We are delighted to announce the participants of the Another Gaze led Critics Workshop at Open City Documentary Festival 2026. Another Gaze was founded in 2016 to provide a nuanced forum for discussio...
opencitylondon.com
This year’s Expanded Realities exhibition, A Sense of Space, brings together projects which explore the relationship between our senses and the environments around us using VR, audio, installation and video games. Find out more about the projects here! opencitylondon.com/events/expan... 🌿
Expanded Realities Exhibition - Open City Documentary Festival
This year’s Expanded Realities exhibition, A Sense of Space, brings together projects which explore the relationship between our senses and the environments around us using a range of media including ...
opencitylondon.com
We are excited to launch our 2026 programme! The 16th edition will take place from April 14th-19th at the ICA, Barbican, BFI, Bertha Dochouse, Rich Mix and Close-Up Film Centre. Featuring 125 films & 16 Expanded Realities projects, our full programme is now live - book now! opencitylondon.com
Home - Open City Documentary Festival
Celebrating the art of non-fiction, Open City Documentary Festival creates an open space in London to nurture and champion the art of creative documentary and non-fiction filmmakers.
opencitylondon.com
we're back! applications are now open for the Open City x Another Gaze Critics Workshop ✍️ more info here >> opencitylondon.com/news/open-ci... @opencitydocs.bsky.social
it was a delight to see Sally Potter introduce her 1970 short Play, as part of @opencitydocs.bsky.social’s ongoing experimental film programme for children, ‘Listen with your eyes’. the kids asked some very sweet questions, which included asking Potter if she got her film camera from Santa!
Day 5 @ Open City Documentary Festival 🥰
Day 4 @ Open City Documentary Festival 🪩
Day 3 @ Open City Documentary Festival 🥰
🎥 @opencitydocs.bsky.social is in full swing! I'll be taking 📷 throughout the festival. Full programme of critical work and conversations: opencitylondon.com/2025-festiva...
Full Programme - Open City Documentary Festival
Open City Documentary Festival creates an open space in London to nurture and champion the art of creative documentary and non-fiction filmmakers. The festival aims to challenge and expand the idea of...
opencitylondon.com
Day 2 @ Open City Documentary Festival 🎥
Day 1 @ Open City Documentary Festival ❤️🔥
The Open City Documentary Festival has begun, and the opening film was SITICULOSA! 😍 This Puglia documentary works incredibly well both visually and thematically: read @clotildechinnici.bsky.social's review! @opencitydocs.bsky.social #OpenCityLondon loudandclearreviews.com/siticulosa-f...
Siticulosa Review: Archeological Journey to Puglia
Maeve Brennan’s Siticulosa is a captivating documentary that opens the audience’s eyes to a reality many may not be familiar with.
loudandclearreviews.com
The Open City Documentary Festival (@opencitydocs.bsky.social) begins today! 😍 Read @clotildechinnici.bsky.social's list of movies to watch at the festival, in various venues across London, on 6-11 May! 🤩 #OpenCityLondon loudandclearreviews.com/open-city-do...
2025 Open City Documentary Festival: 10 Movies to Watch
The 2025 Open City Documentary Festival is back at the beginning of May: this is our guide on 10 movies to watch, from world premieres to retrospectives.
loudandclearreviews.com
The @opencitydocs.bsky.social festival starts today! With screenings across the city, workshops and surgeries for film students there's a lot going on - check out the programme⬇️ opencitylondon.com/2025-festiva...
Full Programme - Open City Documentary Festival
Open City Documentary Festival creates an open space in London to nurture and champion the art of creative documentary and non-fiction filmmakers. The festival aims to challenge and expand the idea of...
opencitylondon.com
We’re pleased to present the fourth Ian White Lecture, given by writer Esther Kinsky. In her talk, Kinsky will speak to the ways that films can teach us to abandon our preconceived notions, opening our minds to the gaze of the filmmaker. 📍 ICA 📅 Sun 11 May, 4pm opencitylondon.com/events/ian-w...
Ian White Memorial Lecture: Esther Kinsky, Entering the Gaze - Open City Documentary Festival
In collaboration with the Ian White Estate, Open City is pleased to present the fourth Ian White Lecture, given by writer Esther Kinsky. This ongoing series celebrates the provocative and enquiring sp...
opencitylondon.com
Our closing film, KOUTÉ VWA, the debut feature by Maxime Jean-Baptiste follows Melrick, a teenage boy, over a summer in French Guiana. The film traces conversations between Melrick & his grandmother, revealing the story of her son’s death. 📍 ICA 📅 Sun 11 May, 7pm opencitylondon.com/events/closi...
Closing Night: Kouté vwa (Listen to the Voices) - Open City Documentary Festival
The debut feature-length work by Maxime Jean-Baptiste follows Melrick, a young teenage boy, as he spends a summer in French Guiana with his grandmother Nicole. The film traces conversations between Me...
opencitylondon.com
The Clock, Or: 89 Minutes of Free Time draws together a wealth of prints from the Austrian Filmmuseum in a somewhat surreal – or childlike – attempt at telling a story of the 20th century and the notion of the cinematic time 📍 Barbican 📅 Sat 10 May, 6:30pm opencitylondon.com/events/the-c...
The Clock, or: 89 Minutes of “Free Time” - Open City Documentary Festival
This programme is a somewhat surreal – or childlike – attempt at telling a story of the 20th century. In a more serious vein, it relates to three different notions of cinematic temporality: it talks a...
opencitylondon.com
In Wild Relations, filmmakers in this year’s programme will discuss the ecological resonances in their work, be it through commitment to artisanal, small scale practices, or attempts to capture the changing worlds that surround us. 📍 Rich Mix 📅 Sat 10 May, 11am opencitylondon.com/events/wild-...
Wild Relations - Open City Documentary Festival
Ecology and ecological encounters on and with the moving image surface as sites of inquiry throughout this year’s programme. In this panel discussion, moderated by artist-filmmaker Gerard Ortín Castel...
opencitylondon.com
Featuring short films by Ewelina Rosinska, Eiko Soga, Sally Lawton & Eva Giolo, Combined Programme: Unstable Rocks presents works which explore journeys, parenthood and landscapes. 📍 Close-Up 📅 Sat 10 May, 6pm opencitylondon.com/events/combi...
Combined Programme: Unstable Rocks - Open City Documentary Festival
Unstable Rocks Ewelina Rosinska | 2024 | Germany, Portugal | 25’ | Digital | Sound Filmed with a Bolex camera, Unstable Rocks offers a meditative exploration of the Portuguese landscape, where geology...
opencitylondon.com
Made as Chetna Vora’s examination film, OYOYO was shot entirely in a student dorm in East Berlin. The film captures the relaxed energy of student life & offers an insider perspective on solidarity amongst a transnational community. 📍 Barbican 📅 Sun 11 May, 3pm opencitylondon.com/events/oyoyo/
Oyoyo - Open City Documentary Festival
Made as Indian-born filmmaker Chetna Vora’s examination film during her studies at the Film and Television Academy in Postdam-Babelsberg, Oyoyo (1980) was shot entirely within a student hall of reside...
opencitylondon.com
Join us to celebrate the launch of MIRAJ’s double issue 13.1/2 and 14.1, making live new research and perspectives on the moving image from its recent issues, through discussion and screenings with an archival twist. Find out more here 👉opencitylondon.com/e... @opencitydocs.bsky.social
We have added a second screening of Armand Yervant Tufenkian’s IN THE MANNER OF SMOKE, a meditation on landscape, images and painting moving between California and the London studio of the painter Dan Hays. 📍 Close-Up 📅 Sun 11 May, 2pm opencitylondon.com/events/in-th...
In The Manner Of Smoke - Open City Documentary Festival
Drawing from his experience as a fire-lookout in the Sequoia forests of the Sierra Nevada in California, Armand Yervant Tufenkian constructs a careful study of the visual documentation of forest fires...
opencitylondon.com
Featuring short films by Hope Strickland, Alex Nevill and Rhea Storr, Combined Programme: A River Holds A Perfect Memory, reflects on British geographies and their connections to colonial and post-colonial histories 📍 ICA 📅 Sun 11 May, 1:30pm opencitylondon.com/events/combi...
Combined Programme: a river holds a perfect memory - Open City Documentary Festival
Notes From Brook House Alex Nevill | 2025 | UK | 28’ | Digital | English spoken Airports, detention centres, sea containers. Slow, roaming shots linger on places of passage and confinement, where mo...
opencitylondon.com
Screening together, Lawrence Abu Hamdan's THE DIARY OF A SKY and Elisabeth Subrin's MANAL ISSA, 2024 explore the sonic reverberations of Israeli infractions into, and bombings of, Lebanese airspace in recent years. 📍ICA 📅 Sat 10 May, 3pm opencitylondon.com/events/manal...
Manal Issa, 2024 + The Diary of a Sky - Open City Documentary Festival
The Diary of a Sky Lawrence Abu Hamdan | 2024 | Lebanon | 44’ | Digital | Arabic spoken, English subtitles Artist Lawrence Abu Hamdan has a sonic research practice that acts to investigate human right...
opencitylondon.com
Coinciding with the presentation of the work at our Expanded Realities exhibition, Ant Hampton will be discussing his project Borderline Visible at the Royal Central School of Speech & Drama. This event is open to the public with free tickets. 📅 Fri 9 May, 6pm www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/liveness-a...
Liveness at a Distance: Concept Touring and Borderline Visible
An interview with Ant Hampton.
eventbrite.co.uk