We are delighted to announce that the winners of the Swedenborg Film Festival 2023 are Siôn Marshall-Waters with Forest Coal Pit, Xiaoxuan Han with Don’t forget to take medicines on time, Matt Hulse with THE SCAN and Niyaz Saghari with Ripple Effect. The winner of the public vote for best film is Billy palumbo with Billy Billy. Warmest congratulations to Siôn, Xiaoxuan, Matt, Niyaz and Billy. Many thanks to all of our shortlisted filmmakers for sharing their fantastic work and thank you to our attendees for a spectacular night.

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SFF2022 WINNERS

announced

We are delighted to announce that the winners of the Swedenborg Film Festival 2022 are Joshua Alexander with the film All I Ever Wanted, Cecilia Araneda with The Space Shuttle Challenger and Parlour Collective with Scenes, Overhead. Warmest congratulations to Joshua, Cecilia and Parlour Collective! Many thanks to all of our shortlisted filmmakers for sharing their fantastic work. The shortlisted films are available to view online here: https://vimeo.com/showcase/9330418

CONGRATULATIONS to these and also to all on the shortlist. More updates to follow. Sign up to the mailing list for details about next year’s SFF.

 

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JUDGES:

MELANIE MANCHOT & JOHN SMITH

SHORTLISTED FILMAKERS:

Due to Covid-19 restrictions in the UK, this year’s Swedenborg Film Festival will take place online. We aim to make the shortlisted films available on Vimeo from Friday 27 November so the public can watch, and there will be a full sequenced screening of all selected films on December 5.  All the shortlisted films will also be featured on the Swedenborg Society’s website and we will be encouraging a public vote.

On December 5, at the screening of all the shortlisted films, our judges will make their selections, and we will announce the result of the public vote. All films will go offline at midnight on December 8.

The Swedenborg House bookshop is reopening for business!

We’re very happy to open our doors to customers again for the first time since March on Tuesday 1 September. Our opening hours are now Monday-Friday, 11am-3pm. We’ve been working hard to make it safe for all customers, so there are some important guidelines. In order to maintain social distancing, there will be a limit of three customers in the shop at a time. We request that masks are worn, and there will be a hand sanitizer dispenser by the door that customers are welcome to use. Only card payments will be accepted in the shop for the time being.

We have a replenished stock of secondhand books for sale, alongside our usual selection of Swedenborg Society books, classics, biographies of Swedenborg and more. All bookshop customers will receive a 20% discount for the month of September, with a 30% discount for Friends and Members of Swedenborg House! We’re looking forward to seeing all of you back in our Bloomsbury bookshop soon.

 

Submit your film here!

Update on Covid-19

Following recent changes to the United Kingdom government recommendations regarding Covid-19, we regret to announce that Swedenborg House is closed to the public until further notice.

Several of our upcoming events will be postponed, including the March 26 opening of Hellish Love: an exhibition of objects from the Swedenborg Collection, our Tao of Islam discussion group and the April 2 book launch of Our Late Familiars. We will make sure to inform anyone on the list for these events of the postponement, and keep you updated regarding future events.

We wish everyone the best in this difficult time. Feel free to contact us with any questions using the email addresses here.

Swedenborg Review 0.02 

The second issue of the Swedenborg Review is now available! Inside, you will find articles ranging from an essay by Iain Sinclair on the shifting traces of Swedenborg’s visionary legacy written after a visit to his summerhouse, to an interview with Michelle Lindson of the Friends of Tower Hamlets Cemetery Park about her work in Swedenborg Gardens. You’ll also find a rediscovered talk by D T Suzuki, given to the Swedenborg Society in 1912, published in the Review.

The best way to get your copy of the Review is to become a Friend of Swedenborg House. For £5 a year, you will receive:

—Free subscription to the Swedenborg Review
—20% discount on Books
—Free gift of a sketchbook or notebook
—Priority Booking and free access to all events
—Advance notice on all events and books
—Free entry to the museum
—Free Friend of Swedenborg House Card

Become a Friend of Swedenborg House here.

Winner of the Swedenborg Film Festival 2019: Atomkraftwerk Zwentendorf by Hope Tucker

image © Hope Tucker, 2019

We are delighted to announce that the winner of the Swedenborg Film Festival 2019 is Hope Tucker with her film Atomkraftwerk Zwentendorf, as chosen by our guest judge, the novelist Chloe Aridjis.

Following a successful series of visionary feature films (from Carlos Reygadas’s Silent Light to Jem Cohen’s Museum Hours to John Burgan’s Memory of Berlin) our shortlist of ten short films on the theme ‘Use and Purpose’, curated by Gareth Evans and Nora Foster, was screened at Swedenborg House on Saturday 7 December.

The shortlist comprised: Yuan Kong (I SEE YOU), Nicolas Jimy Awashish (Kanockatonanok), Nick Jordan (Kobbwebjar), Georg Koszulinski (Continents Quiver As Memories Erupt Into Earthflames), Maya Ramsay (Leave or Remain), Alexandra Kaucher (Unrest in Iran), Sista Pratesi (10,000 Years Part III), Hope Tucker (Atomkraftwerk Zwentendorf), Charlotte Pryce (Pwdre Ser: the rot of stars) and Stephanie Barber (Oh My Homeland).

Hope Tucker’s winning film Atomkraftwerk Zwentendorf, a documentary film about a nuclear power plant in Austria, is a monument to the power of public protest and the potential of a democratic vote. Tucker transforms what we know as a daily form of narrative through THE OBITUARY PROJECT, a compendium of moving image that gives new life to the antiquated documentary practice of salvage ethnography. Works from the project have screened in festivals including 25fps, Zagreb; Ann Arbor Film Festival; European Media Art Festival, Osnabrück; Images Festival, Toronto; International Film Festival, Rotterdam; Kasseler Documentary Festival; New York Film Festival and Punto de Vista, Pamplona.

Special mention went to two filmmakers. One recipient was Maya Ramsay with her film Leave or Remain, a short film made on a shipwrecked migrant boat. Ramsay works with historically and politically important sites, employing a variety of processes to capture visual histories that would otherwise be lost or unseen.

The other recipient of a special mention was Stephanie Barber, with her film Oh My Homeland. Oh My Homeland meditates on the political implications of the Verdi aria ‘O patria mia’ (a mournful and complicated love letter to Aida’s homeland) in a time in which love of country is hard to muster. Barber’s films and videos have screened nationally and internationally in solo and group shows at MOMA, NY; The Tate Modern and The Paris Cinémathèque among other galleries, museums and festivals.

find out more

Visit Film Freeway to submit your film to the Swedenborg Film Festival 2020:

submit here

From left: Alexandra Kaucher, Chloe Aridjis, Maya Ramsay and Sista Pratesi. Photo: Alex Rowe