Sans Souci Festival of Dance Cinema, SansSouciFest.org

Call for Entries


The Sans Souci Festival of Dance Cinema is currently closed to entries. Please check back again in the spring to see next season's call deadlines.

Curatorial Criteria

When choosing works for exhibition and installation we consider thoughtful forms and themes, investigative / innovative / experimental approaches, production values, audience appeal, and how the piece will fit with or complement others we are considering. None of these criteria is a must; none is more important than the others; excellence in any one or two areas may be sufficient for acceptance.

Art-oriented shorts under 16 minutes are strongly preferred. Short documentaries will be considered.

Note that we are not interested in simple recordings of dance on a proscenium stage — cinematic elements must be an integral part of the entry.

a frame from Moving Yerevan, 2014, by Jevan Chowdhury & Nare Aghababyan
frame from "Moving Yerevan," 2014, by Jevan Chowdhury & Nare Aghababyan

Rules and Terms

This year we will primarily be screening dance shorts of 16 minutes or less. While the length limit is 30 minutes, the films we do screen at that length tend to be dance documentaries. We are most interested in dance films that integrate the aesthetics of dance and film, and are an appropriate length in relationship to their treatment and style.

Films submitted marked as "Student" or "First-time Filmmaker" will be curated in our "Emerging Artist" Category. If accepted, the work will be so designated in the program.

If your film is accepted, we will ask for a still frame from your film to illustrate your work in our programs and/or promotional materials; if you would like to select stills yourself, please send one to three images. They should have the same pixel dimensions and aspect ratio as your film's frame and clearly convey movement or dancing in the image.

If your film is accepted, we may reach out to you in the future to share your work for our touring program. While we usually don't have the budget to fund screening fees for these events, we deeply appreciate your generosity in sharing your work to help us develop a wider audience for screen dance. PLEASE NOTE: Selecting the second option when submitting (Additionally, I grant permission for SSF to screen this entry at subsequent venues) will greatly increase the likelihood of your work being invited to our touring program after initial acceptance. However, this line item is not taken into account when judging for initial acceptance into the festival, and we may still ask you for permission to bring your work on tour.

If you are accepted, your film will be part of the Sans Souci Archive, listed on our website. Your film itself will not be published nor distributed to any other person or organization, including online, but if you provide a trailer, we will include that link on your listing on our webpage. Your film may be exhibited completely or partially during educational events organized by the Sans Souci and its campus affiliates (Screening Partners), for example as part of lectures on screen dance at universities.

Physical support (posters, etc.) of films is sent at the artist's own risk. The festival is not responsible of the damage the physical support may suffer, and there will be no refunds. After the festival, Sans Souci will not return any materials.