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Film short abstract

Sheep flocks in the Lake District are ‘hefted’ to the fell - overtime they developed an instinct to remain on a patch of land. Through intimate engagement with the process of craftsmen (farmers and people who create with wool), we learn/reflect on the ways in which they too are 'hefted' to the land.

Film synopsis

On the fells of the Lake District, sheep graze without being fenced in, yet they do not wander. Centuries ago, shepherds taught them the invisible geographical boundaries of their land. The flocks are now ‘hefted’ to the fell; meaning that over time, they developed an instinct to remain on this patch of land, otherwise known as their ‘heft’.

Today, the tradition of hefting is threatened due to the de-stocking of the fells in an effort to make way for re-wilding projects. While conservation measures continue to advance, it is vital to understand, at this moment of transformation, the ways in which people express their connections to the land.

I investigate this question through the medium of wool as a storytelling device. Yan Tan Tethera is the title of that story. This ancient method of counting sheep and stitches in the Lake District connects my two craftsmen, farmers and those that create with wool. With this in mind, I follow the journey of the sheep’s fleece as these craftsmen interact with it. From the sheep, all the way to the end woven product.

The Lake District is deeply important to me. My film serves to reflect on this place at this particular moment in time. To hear the stories of those who have built their lives there, those who feel bound up with the land, or in other words, 'hefted' to it.

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Film short abstract

A sensory ethnographic documentary about Jin Li, a 29-year-old autistic artist from South Korea, navigating family, art school, and a transnational art career. Through her painting and humming, the film explores how neurodivergent communication challenges normative ideas of relationality.

Film synopsis

The Cat that Lives in Your Dreams is an ethnographic documentary that follows Jin Li, an autistic Korean painter, as she travels with her family from Seoul to New York for a solo exhibition at Positive Exposure, a disability arts gallery. Rather than treating disability as something that needs to be "treated," the film tracks how Jin Li’s art and relationships move between Korean family- and church-based care worlds and Euro-American disability arts institutions, opening up possibilities for interpersonal connection and recognition in a polarised world.

Filmed over more than a year between Seoul and New York, the documentary foregrounds art-making as ethnographic evidence and centres Jin Li’s agency in decisions about filming, editing, and circulation. It lingers on Korean talk shows where she struggles with scripted speech, special-education classrooms and church gatherings where care is negotiated, and everyday routines with her sisters and mother. These scenes are then set against the New York exhibition, where her canvases and captions let her set the terms of encounter with curators, visitors, and disability communities. The film asks what counts as “credible” evidence of autistic life when it is already mediated through Korean family obligation, Protestant cure narratives, institutional assessments, and the expectations of Euro-American festivals and funders.

Formally, The Cat that Lives in Your Dreams draws on observational cinema and sensory ethnography—handheld camerawork at Jin Li’s eye level, long takes, and a soundscape built from brush sounds, humming, and overlapping conversations—to invite viewers into autistic temporalities without claiming transparent access to her interiority. For the EASA 2026 film programme, it offers a grounded case in how visual anthropology might respond to polarisation by cultivating disability-led, relational documentary practice, treating access work, consent, and shared authorship as conditions for imagining more livable transnational futures.

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Film short abstract

Loose Ends reveals a silent disaster in Dutch nursing homes during the COVID-19 pandemic. Care workers faced mass death, fear, and impossible ethical choices, while residents died isolated from loved ones. This film gives voice to experiences that were often left unseen.

Film synopsis

During the COVID-19 pandemic, a silent disaster occurred in Dutch nursing homes. Nursing home employees saw how elderly people died en masse and abruptly, often without being able to say goodbye to their loved ones. There were little to no tests or protective equipment available. Employees faced impossible choices. Because how do you take into account the one and a half meter distance measure, when you have to wash and dress the elderly? How do you provide good care and prevent the elderly from dying? These ethical dilemmas, uncertainty, and panic were investigated by Lianne (A.L.) Cremers and Cato Janssen of the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam during a visual ethnographic study from October to December 2021. This research took place in collaboration with Dutch nursing homes and is part of the European-funded HERoS project. The aim of this project is to collect and share lessons learned and best practices from the COVID-19 crisis response in Europe.