When Queer Cinema meets Mindfulness
As part of the Queer Film Festival Munich (QFFM), Ukrainian filmmaker and cultural studies scholar Anastasia Nizamova invites you to the workshop “When Queer Cinema meets Mindfulness” on Saturday, October 17, at 2 pm. In this experimental format, the Odesa-born and now Munich-based artist combines mindfulness exercises with film theory and elements of “Slow Cinema” to help participants experience film, time and their viewing habits in a new way.
Ever-shortening attention spans shape our everyday lives and the way we watch films. According to the formalist Vitor Shklovsky, habits dull our perception – we no longer truly see the world, but merely recognize it automatically.
Art, on the other hand, has the task of breaking us out of this autopilot by making the familiar unfamiliar and returning us to the “sensation of life.” This is where film theory and mindfulness practice meet in the cinema.
Slow Cinema
Anastasia Nizamova takes up this idea in her experimental format “When Queer Cinema meets Mindfulness,” combining meditative practices with the practice of looking. Through an introduction to the topic, small exercises, and elements of “Slow Cinema,” she invites participants to experience film, time, and our viewing habits differently. Here you can find more details on the workshop concept
The workshop is led by Anastasiia Nizamova, a Ukrainian filmmaker and cultural studies scholar based in Munich. She holds a Master’s degree in Cultural Studies from Odesa Mechnikov National University, where she wrote her thesis on the interpretation of reality in postmodern cinema.
Anastasiia subsequently trained at Cinema Studio Odesa. After directing her own short films and organizing cultural projects in Odesa, she moved to Germany, where she has worked with, among others, Münchner Kammerspiele, Kalekone Film, the University of Television and Film Munich (HFF), Recycled TV and the Hof International Film Festival.
When Queer Cinema meets Mindfulness Meditative practices whil watching movies
When Saturday, 17 October 2026, 2 pm
Where tba
Tickets 9 Euro
Organised by Munich Kyiv Queer, QFFM, Munich Pride, Department of Culture
This is how you can donate
INDIVIDUAL HELP Munich Kyiv Queer has its own fundraising campaign via https://www.paypal.me/ConradBreyer to support queer people in Ukraine who are in need or on the run. Why? Because not all LGBTIQ* are organised in the local LGBTIQ*-groups. This help is direct, fast and free of charge if you choose the option “For friends and family” on PayPal. If you don’t have PayPal, you can alternatively send money to the private account of Conrad Breyer, speaker of Munich Kyiv Queer, IBAN: DE427015000021121454.
All requests from the community are meticulously checked in cooperation with our partner organisations in Ukraine. If they can help themselves, they take over. If the demands for help exceed their (financial and/or material) possibilities, we will step in.
HELP FOR LGBTIQ* ORGANISATIONS To support LGBTIQ* in Ukraine we have helped set up the Alliance Queer Emergency Aid Ukraine, in which around 40 German LGBTIQ* Human Rights organisations are involved. All these groups have access to very different Human Rights organisations in Ukraine and use funds for urgently needed care or evacuation of queer people. Every donation helps and is used 100 percent to benefit queer people in Ukraine. Donate here
VULNERABLE GROUP And here you can find out why queer people in war need our support.
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