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In 2010 Polish and world animation celebrated 100th jubilee of its most important techniques - puppet animation. In June 1910 in Kaunas, Lituania, in a home studio, Polish artist Wladyslaw Starewicz made an interesting experiment. Fascinated by variety of forms and shapes of insects he decided to film most interesting species. He chose stag-beetles, insects living in Lithuanian primeval forests, that got his attentions some time before. That is how “Fight of Beetles” came into being. Same year Starewicz started to work on the first puppet feature story – “Beautiful Lukanida”. Se-Ma-For is the only Polish studio, that for over 60 years consistently continues the traditions of Starewicz’s work. That fact inspired us to celebrate the 100th jubilee of puppet animation with a festival dedicated to animation, specifically to puppet animation.First edition of Se-ma-for Film Festival - a new, international event dedicated to art of animation, especially puppet animation - ended with a great success. For three magical, intense days we presented over 300 films, including 70 premieres! Over 3500 viewers, approx. 1400 of which were children, took part in the screenings.

For one beautiful weekend we presented puppet animation – celebrating the 100th anniversary – in it's various contexts – determined by genres as well as other aspects. Those who visited our Festival had a chance to see different faces of this extraordinary animation technique: “cheerful” (in extremely funny films by Monika Kuczyniecka), “classical” (at Big Se-ma-for review), “mysterious” (during four-part Quay Brothers retrospective), “touching” (in Suzie Templeton's films), “scary” (during world's first horror puppet animations review entitled SCARY PUPPETS), “commercial” (at puppet ads review), “children's” (at reviews of DWF ENTROPIA and ANIMATION OF VACATION by Se-ma-for), “musical” (at puppet music videos review), “experimental” (at a premiere of “Red-end and the Seemingly Symbiotic Society”.

Most of the Festival screenings took part in Polish Filmmakers Association's Cinema POLONIA at Piotrkowska Street (puppet animations only). Special screenings – including Lithuanian and Russian animation reviews, as well as retrospectives of befriended festivals took place in CYTRYNA Cinema and KINEMATOGRAF in the Film Museum in Lodz.

During the Festival we had a pleasure to host many animation creators, such as: Witold Giersz, Tadeusz Wilkosz, Valentas Askinis (Lithuania), Jurate Leikaite (Lithuania), Monika Kuczyniecka, Benjamin Oke (UK), Robin Noorda (Netherlands), Bethany de Forest (Netherlands), Luis Claudio Papini (Italy), Paweł Partyka (Denmark), Marek Skrobecki, Glenn Z. Taunton (UK); culture authorities: Director of Castle Museum in Lancut - Wit Karol Wojtowicz, President of ASIFA Poland - Wioletta Sowa, music journalist - Robert Leszczynski, as well as prominent expert on history of animation - Marcin Giżycki and critics: Adriana Prodeus, Kuba Mikurda, Małgorzata Sady, Tadeusz Szyma, Hanna Margolis. As a surprise – legendary Dutch musician Frank Gerrits, known as Phantom Frank, visited the Festival. We alos hosted Swiss film producer Luc Toutounghi and two directors cooperating with him - Michail Gyoirik and Yves Gutjahr. An important part of our festival included meetings with authors and journalists (Monika Kuczyniecka, Robin Noorda, Bethany de Forest, Frank Gerritsen, Tadeusz Wilkosz, Valentas Askinis, Jurate Leikaite, Marcin Giżycki, Kuba Mikurda, Adriana Prodeus, Alicja and Mariusz Jodko) following chosen screenings. Also, in Vinoteka Cafe took place meeting with producer Zbigniew Żmudzki, who lift the veil of secrecy of animated films realization process.

During the first day of the Festival we unveiled a monument of penguin Pik Pok created by Magdalena Walczak and Marcin Mielczarek at Fala Water-park in Lodz. This is the second, after Teddy Floppy Ears character from Se-ma-for animations honoured with a statue. The event was followed by Pik-Pok Pik-nic organised by Se-ma-for Museum of Fairytale, to which over 200 attended.

Also on Saturday, 25th September at noon, we added the next Star to the film constellation of Stars' Alley at Piotrkowska Street – the star honouring Wladyslaw Starewicz, a pioneer of puppet animation. Museum of Fairytale organize animation workshops for youngsters using Toon Boom software (23rd-24th Sept.) and special workshops for children at Fala Water-park (23rd Sept.).

Moreover, as a part of associated events, in cooperation with International Festival of Comics and Games and Mala Litera bookshop and cafe, we organized the first edition of Storyboard Project, presenting works of Michal Janusik (storyboard to “Birth”, exhib. Se-ma-for Museum of Fairytale), Adrian Madej (storyboard to “Benek and Zenek's Little Bookshop”, exhib. Mala Litera Art), Michał Murawski (“Storyboard in advertisement”, meeting in Owoce i Warzywa), Kamil Polak (storyboard to “The Lost Town of Switez”, exhib. Mala Litera Art).

On Saturday in Wytwornia Club, during Closing Ceremony of the first edition of Se-ma-for Film Festival, awards were given: PETER Award for Lifetime Achievements in animated film, especially puppet animation. Laureates of 2010 Festival are: Quay Brothers, Tadeusz Wilkosz and Witold Giersz. Announcement of the awards was followed by three special screenings: the world premiere of latest Se-ma-for and Munk's Studio co-production – UNDERLIFE by Jaroslaw Konopka, Polish premiere of WALTER, A DIALOGUE WITH THE IMAGINATION by Dutch animator Niels Hoebers as well as the only puppet animation made by Witold Giersz – EXPECTATION (1963). During the first part of the Gala a great duo from Warsaw – SzaZa (Paweł Szamburski, Patryk Zakrocki) presented enchanting musical interpretation of four films by Starewicz. Later a band from Wroclaw, Little Instruments played the compositions to eight short films made by the father of movie tricks, Georges Melies.
The first edition of Se-ma-for Film Festival is over now. We'd like to thank to all the good people and institutions for a great help in making this wonderful celebration of puppet animation such a success!