The International Finnish project of 2015 is completed

The premiere of the documentary short film "Repin. Life on the border” took place in the Museum “Estate of I.Ye.Repin “Penates” within the framework of The Night of Museums. This film is the result of joint work of students of creative specialties of St.Petersburg State University of Film and Television and students of The Faculty of Media of The University of Applied Sciences of Karelia (Joensuu, Finland), participated in the international project of student and teacher exchange, which is the fourth year successfully connects the film crew of Russian and Finnish students.
 

Filming "Repin. Life on the Border" took place in the two countries - in Russia and in Finland, and participants started script development in March. First, there was the idea to make a film, which subject can unite two countries, two neighboring nations, and, as usual, all agreed with the idea it could best done through art. Here and there the figure of the great Russian painter, who being a Russian and then Soviet citizen with his property came to be in Finland. The life story of Ilya Repin, unusual and intriguing, fascinated by both sides and a mutual process of education started - Russian students learned about the many paintings of the beauty of Finnish nature and Finnish students observed famous "The Boatmen" and "The Cossacks" reproductions with interest.

We hosted five Finnish students and one teacher in St. Petersburg from 13 to 17 April 2015. During the shooting they was lucky to see originals of the masterpieces and share their impressions before the camera.

The crew worked in in the Museum “Estate of I.Ye.Repin “Penates”, as well as in  Russian Museum. It should be noted that in crew greeted very warmly “Penates”, they were given the creative freedom and almost two days the museum was at the disposal of young documentary filmmakers. We express our thanks to the museum's director Tatiana Borodina for understanding and hospitality and to the head of cinematography department Professor Nikolai Volkov for the assistance in organizing the shooting.

Students worked quite quickly  in The Russian Museum, but managed to not only capture the video, but also take a tour of the museum, as for Finnish students it was the first visit to St. Petersburg. Although students had intense work on the shooting of the film these 5 days, so they also had a good time together. Our students, who worked on the project as the volunteers, assisted in carrying filming equipment, catering students, accompanied them to the hostel and, of course, they were the guides to the most interesting places.

20 students of the University of Applied Arts of Karelia in the direction "Tourism" are also took part In the process of filming. They have arrived to St. Petersburg together with the students of "Media", but spent time on their program. April, 15, it was organized for them a meeting with the students of the Faculty of Media and Tourism of St.Petersburg State University of Film and Television 3 course.
 

From 17 to 23 April the project has continued in Finland in Joensuu at the University of Applied Arts of Karelia, where the whole crew came. At this stage, students are engaged in image processing, sound production , editing and special effects. To thisstage the Finnish colleagues have provided all the conditions: well-equipped laboratory for post-production, cozy apartment accommodation and even bicycles for ecological movement between points. A perfect complement to the film was the author's music, specially written by a Finnish member of the project.

Now, an international project in 2015 with the Finnish film school successfully finished, the film will be the part of the video collection of the Museum “Estate of I.Ye.Repin “Penates” and will be presented at festivals, and we are waiting for new comers to the joint filming with foreign students!