CineDoc CARAVAN

A caravan of culture and ideas, the CineDoc Caravan Documentary Festival sets off from the city of Volos, traveling through the villages of Pelion, as well as the islands of the Northern Sporades. The same caravan will simultaneously traverse six villages along the rivers of the Thessaly plain over six days before it ends up at the village of Ilias in Karditsa, for its closing celebration.

The aim of CineDoc Caravan is to screen documentaries, in the presence of creators and experts, offering a complete viewing experience with discussions and parallel activities, involving and activating local communities and visitors and contributing to cultural decentralization and dispersion in the Region of Thessaly. The recent natural disasters that have struck the region of Thessaly have sown not wheat, cotton, and fruit, but pain, economic hardship, and fear of the next climate change. Rivers and water now cause insecurity in people’s lives. CineDoc Caravan aims to restore the positive meaning that rivers had in people’s minds, reminding us that we used to connect around rivers, build villages, cultivate crops, and enjoy ourselves in the shade of broad-leaved trees.

The festival, which exclusively screens documentary films, aims to inform, provoke thought, encourage dialogue, and inspire collective action on issues such as the environment, gender equality, inclusivity, education, history, and more.

In addition, CineDoc Caravan offers to audiences in the region the opportunity to enjoy the same experience as audiences in the capital, contributing to cultural decentralization.

For the next five years, the goal of the CineDoc Caravan is, on the one hand, to strengthen the CineDoc institution in the city of Volos and, on the other hand, to expand its activities within the Regional Unit of Magnesia, the Northern Sporades, as well as the Regional Units of Karditsa, Larissa, and Trikala, and to strengthen its impact on local communities, while also serving as a magnet for domestic tourism in the villages and islands of the region. In addition, it will include in its activities villages in all the Regional Units of Thessaly which are located in the river basins that have caused disasters and which do not have access to film screenings and audiovisual stimuli and subsequent discussions on contemporary problems and events.

[the images are from Dimitris Koutsiabasakos’ film “The Goals Of August” which will be screened during the CineDoc Caravan Festival]