Current Frames is a survey on the international short film scene, featuring perspectives and stories from around the world
Discover the latest Japanese animation shorts from NeW NeW, a Creator Support Program initiative connecting Japanese animators to the world. With the slogan ‘NeW Way, NeW World’, dive into these bold stories that promises to offer a NeW way of seeing.
The screening will be followed by a post-screening dialogue session with Singaporean experimental animators EXYL and Ryan Benjamin Lee.
Lured by the gifted blind Hochi’s skills in playing the biwa (Japanese short-necked wooden lute), spirits began visiting him and he performed for them night after night. Fearing that the ghosts would eventually claim his life, the priest covered his entire body with sacred sutra writings to protect him. Caught between the visible world and the unseen, Hoichi’s heart raged violently.
A serene, pencil-drawn animation portraying the repitition and daily scenes of a coffee shop.
In a world filled with uncertainty, life continues as the seasons turn. People move along with these changes, a little lost but also finding small pleasures and joys.
In a cave, it wakes. Human in shape, but only an empty puppet. As the line between self and other dissolves, it realises the cycle of life and death.
Tsumire idolises her older brother. She believes everything he says although she looks down on his girlfriends, except for QT, a conspiracy theorist whom she admires. Troubled by her small eyes since childhood, Tsumire’s perspective in life starts to change through her interactions with QT.
In the midst of a frenzied night, a man finds himself lost in the crevasse of time. Buried under broken promises, he is held at a distance from a place he longs for, while words drift to him from the shore.
Hoji Tsuchiya began creating animation in 2004, where he explores expressions that traverse time and space, from folklore to the cosmos, using paper-cut animation, collage, stop-motion objects, and more. His short film Black Long Skirt (2010) was nominated for the Ottawa International Animation Festival, leading to screenings at numerous festivals both in Japan and abroad. The music video that he created, Spring time-old man for Uri Nakayama (2016), was selected as a Jury Selection work at the Japan Media Arts Festival. He works extensively across short films, music videos, NHK E-television animated series, web movies, and more.
With the theme of time, space, and memory, she creates animations mainly by drawing or filming frames one by one, using classical techniques such as 8mm film and cyanotype, as well as drawing animation. Her animation films have been shown at the Zagreb International Animation Festival, GLAS Animation Festival, Image Forum Festival, and other festivals in Japan and abroad. She has been awarded the New Cosmos of Photography 2021 Honorable Mention (selected by Yuki Onodera), the Hokkaido Governor’s Award at the New Chitose Airport Animation Film Festival, and the Yoji Kuri Award at the ASK? Film Festival. She is a member of Japan Society of Image Arts and Sciences (Analog Media Research Association).
Capturing everyday scenes and utilizing music and ambient sounds, Shohei Ohmae strives to create lively characters and a witty style interweaving humor and pathos.
He won an award at the 8th New Chitose Airport International Animation Festival for his film One Day (2021). He has also worked on music videos for Japanese bands like Yuzu and Awesome City Club. He is currently working on a new short film.
Shinobu Soejima produces short stop-motion films, installations, and sculptures employing organic materials such as rice, meat, insects, as well as puppets. By fully utilizing the mechanics of animation, she explores the dissolution of boundaries between life and non-life, center and periphery, and the visible and the invisible. Her works have been presented internationally at film festivals and exhibitions, and have received numerous awards, including a Special Mention from the Ecumenical Jury at the 68th International Short Film Festival Oberhausen, the Bronze Satoshi Kon Award at the Fantasia International Film Festival, and the Eriko Kimura Award at Art Award Tokyo Marunouchi 2018.
Shiika Okada specializes in creating animated works that explore themes of eros, love, and gender. She has received numerous awards and nominations at the Animafest Zagreb, Pia Film Festival, and International Film Festival Rotterdam. Her debut live-action feature film Kisspeptin Chronicles was released in theaters in 2025.
Sumito Sakakibara graduated from the Royal College of Art in 2004, with the support of the Japanese Agency for Cultural Affairs’ Artist Overseas Study Program. His work revolves around personal themes, using repetition, metamorphosis, and frame structures unique to 2D animation film making. In recent years, he has been creating video installations and paintings in which multiple instances of the same person or object are simultaneously projected within a single space. His recent work Iizuna Fair is currently on display as part of the permanent collection at the Nagano Prefectural Museum of Art.
