Festival Description

The festival is based on a concept of international review programmes, including presentations of animators’ portraits, the school of animation, authors' retrospectives, and presentations of animated films and studios, as well as accompanying fringe programmes (lectures, exhibitions, multimedia events).  ANIMANIMA has existed since 2007, traditionally held under the auspices of the City of Čačak and the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Serbia.

Animanima International Animation Festival Coverage

The festival will have no competition programme in 2026. The next edition of the Animanima Festival will take place in 2028,

Animanima International Animation Festival Call for Entries

The festival invites authors from all over the world to submit their films.
▪ The competition program has two categories: 1) Graduation film and first professional film 2) Films for children aged 6 to 10 years. 
▪ Only films made after 1st January 2025 can be entered. 
▪ No entry fee is charged for the film submissions.
▪ Works in any available animation techniques are accepted. For any film that represents a combination of animation and live-action, the overall animated segment must be at least 50% of the total length of the film.
▪ The maximum duration of the film for the competition programs is up to 15 minutes 

Categories
Graduation film and first professional film
Films for children aged 6 to 10 years. 

Awards:

Main Competition:
▪ ANIMANIMA Grand Prix (money prize)
▪ Special Distinctions of the Jury (by each member of the jury)
▪ Art Director's Choice (honorary mention)
▪ Audience Award

Films for children competition:
▪ Award for the Best film for children (money prize)
▪ Special Distinction of the Jury 

• Festival Regulations & Submission via FilmFreeway  (opening: 1 May 2026)
• Deadline: 30 June 2026
  
  

Previous Animanima Coverage

Below is a brief summary of Zippy Frames' coverage of the Animanima International Animation Festival in Čačak, Serbia.

2017: The 11th Animanima Festival (5–9 September) combined six competition programmes with retrospectives, workshops, lectures and feature screenings. The main jury consisted of Carolina López Caballero, Tal Gadon and Zippy Frames editor Vassilis Kroustallis, while Olga Bobrowska, Timon Leder and Milan Milosavljević judged the children's competition. Programme highlights included 'Revolting Rhymes', 'The Red Turtle', 'My Life as a Zucchini' and 'Psiconauts: The Forgotten Children', alongside a Bruno Bozzetto retrospective. Special focuses presented contemporary Greek animation, Bezalel Academy graduation films, Spanish animation history and early Serbian animation, while Steven Woloshen led a cameraless-animation workshop. 

2018: The 12th edition (4–8 September) selected 30 films from 18 countries for its main competition. The jury of Špela Čadež, Vessela Dantcheva and Nikita Diakur awarded the Grand Prix to Réka Bucsi's 'Solar Walk', with Paul Bush's 'Ride' receiving the Special Jury Award; 'Wicked Girl', 'Musical Traumas' and 'Guaxuma' received individual jury distinctions. The children's competition was judged by Lea Vidaković, Pavel Horáček and Piotr Kardas, with 'Funny Fish' winning the Periscope Award, 'The Fruits of Clouds' receiving the Special Jury Award and 'Shell with an Ocean Inside' a special distinction. A separate Junior Jury of young viewers complemented the professional juries, while 'The Death, Father and Son' received the Audience Award.  

2024

 During the four festival days from 6th to 9th November, the Great Hall of the Cultural Center in Čačak, Serbia, will be the venue for the main competition programme, presenting a selection of thirty-eight films from twenty countries. The jury in charge of the programme includes Christian Gasser, the assistant professor from HSLU in Lucerne, Waltraud Grausgruber, the artistic director of the Vienna Tricky Women/Trick Realities festival and the well-known Serbian director, animator and producer Vojin Vasović.

The jury for the international program of professional films for children, AnimanimaKIDS, is headed by German director Julia Ocker, known worldwide for the series Animanimals (screened in 180 countries and with more than seventy awards), produced by the renowned Film Bilder studio in Stuttgart. The panel includes Jelena Oroz, an animator and illustrator from Croatia, and Marija Vulić, the artistic director of the AnimatorFest festival in Jagodina, Serbia.

Animanima No. 18 will present two exceptional focus programmes – a panorama of new Swiss animated films, and a collection of award-winning films from the Tricky Women/Tricky Realities festival with a focus on animated works by women. This year we are selecting animated music videos from the Canadian online video library STASH, and the exhibition space of the Cultural Center Čačak is dedicated to comics, more precisely to the intriguing and witty omnibus comic album 'At Home', a joint project of eleven female authors gathered in the artistic organization Stripotetke.

Browse the Animanima Festival Coverage Archive