DokuTalks
DokuTalks brings together filmmakers, thinkers and audiences for urgent conversations about film and society.
Masterclasses
DokuFest’s Masterclasses bring audiences closer to the creative process, as filmmakers share the choices, methods and experiences behind their work.
Short Film Forum
A DokuFest platform supporting young filmmakers to develop, present and advance short film projects.
Forum Guest Country: Italy
DokuFest's partnership with the Italian Short Film Center welcomes Italy as the Forum's 2026 Guest Country, connecting Italian projects, filmmakers and archival cinema with Balkan producers, funds and decision-makers. This partnership is supported by Italian Embassy in Prishtina and Istituto Italiano di Cultura - Tirana.
Friday, August 14
17:00
Shkolla e Muzikes 'Lorenc Antoni'
DokuTalks
Visioning the Public Cinema
As work begins on the Network of Public Cinemas in Kosovo, this conversation opens the process to filmmakers, programmers, curators, critics, cultural workers and audiences. Rather than presenting a finished model, it asks what a public cinema can be today and how we can collectively shape its future?
The discussion brings together local experiences in reviving and programming public cinemas in Kosovo and international experiences in festival programming, audience development and cinema networks. Together, the speakers will explore what gives a public cinema life beyond its walls: how we cultivate the habit of watching films together, develop programmes that respond to their communities, involve audiences in shaping cultural spaces, and build cinemas as places of participation, cultural exchange and shared experiences.
Rather than offering definitive answers, the conversation marks the beginning of a broader public process that will contribute to the development of the Network of Public Cinemas in Kosovo.
Panelists
Blerta Zeqiri - Director of Kosovo Cinematography Center
Veton Nurkollari - Artistic Director of DokuFest
Per Fikse - Director of the Minimalen Short Film Festival in Trondheim, Norway
Elena Ciofalo - Italian Short Film Center & Italian Association for Arthouse Cinema
Moderator
Ares Shporta - Executive Director of Lumbardhi Foundation
DokuTalk is organized by DokuFest in partnership with PAKT - Plattform for Art, Culture and Heritage and Lumbardhi Foundation, in cooperation with the Heinrich Böll Foundation (HBS).
Admission to DokuTalks is free. Seating is limited and available on a first-come, first-served basis.
More in DokuTalks
Hybrid Cinema as Political Language
When the past, cultural legacies, and material heritage are forcibly erased or destroyed, how do filmmakers respond? This panel asks whether hybrid cinema can forge a new political language, one capable of challenging official narratives and reimagining what has been lost.
After Silence: Film, Testimony and Justice after Conflict-Related Sexual Violence
Moving from testimony and the visible and hidden traces of war in Ukraine, through the lasting consequences of wartime sexual violence in Kosovo, to an intimate story of femicide, family absence and fear in Mexico, this DokuTalk explores how filmmakers use memory, digital traces and performance to create spaces for recognition, solidarity and justice.
Inherited Memory
How do filmmakers create a relationship with home when home is remembered, inherited, lost, or politically unreachable? Is home a place, a language, a family story or a filmic reconstruction? Kosovar diaspora filmmakers, alongside voices from other displaced contexts, explore what distance reveals, what it distorts, and how it changes a filmmaker's responsibility.
Who Helps a Short Film Travel?
A short film rarely travels on the strength of the film alone. It also needs a team that can communicate its vision, partners who understand what the project needs, and networks that can connect it to the right opportunities. This DokuTalk looks at the practical decisions behind a film’s journey. How should directors and producers communicate? When does a co-production bring real value? What do festivals, markets and sales agents look for, and how can filmmakers build relationships that continue beyond the first pitch?
Images of Resistance: When Documentation Becomes Activism
Images recorded during moments of resistance can do more than document what happened. They can carry a local struggle across borders, preserve memories that those in power may prefer forgotten, and turn witnessing into a form of participation.
