Rajna, Antonio and Marija represent Croatia at World Youth Media Summit!
International Youth Media Summit was founded in 2006 and its aim is to encourage young people to use media as a major platform for expressing and emphasizing their opinions on current world problems and as a tool for change that can fix the future for us all. Media literacy is still underdeveloped, and new information and communication technologies are a difficult obstacle to those who do not know how to use them. Young people should achieve a certain degree of media literacy so that they can become interactive partners in the media space. One of the ways to achieve media literacy is participation at World Youth Media Summit. At the ninth consecutive Summit in Los Angeles, held from July 14 to 27 there are 75 representatives from 25 world countries, under the motto Youth is the most important chapter in life.
One can participate at the Summit individually or as a member of a delegation of a certain country. Each participating country has three delegates. Croatia has this year participated for the first time. As a kind of leader in children and youth filmmaking in Croatia, the Croatian Film Club's Association is the logical Croatian representative at the World Youth Media Summit. CFA is represented by Marija Ratković Vidaković, manager of festival programs, while the Croatian team consists of two more children - prominent filmmakers from Youth Film Festival and Four River Film Festival. Their names are Antonio Britvar and Rajna Racz from Zagreb. Antonio described their participation at the Summit: "After only three days of the experience I feel like never before – as if I'm in my own world, not alone, but together with countless colleagues from 25 countries! I thank absolutely all the perpetrators of this wonderful feeling, and above all, the Croatian Film Club's Association and my mentors from the Hodači po žici Association and all those who gave us the opportunity not only to experience something new and unique, but also allowed us to show who we are and make a change!". While Rajna and Antonio participated at the workshops, Marija was one of the mentors of young filmmakers and a member of the trainers' team.
Film art (and media literacy, in general) moving toward teamwork is an ideal environment to overcome all cultural barriers on one hand and the implementation of direct and indirect already acquired knowledge and experience on the other. By involving YFF and FRFF participants into the Summit we get added value for these festivals, while Croatia is positioned on the world map of children and youth creativity. Third, but not least important reason is the presentation of the Croatian town of Karlovac in triple context - that of film, education and of course, the general one. It is needless to mention the fact that events like this present Croatia and Karlovac in the tourist aspect, which should certainly be used in the largest extent possible. Knowing Croatian Film Club's Association and their Karlovac member, Cinema Club Karlovac, it would not be surprising that one day they host the Summit.
18.07.2014.