One World Festival has a new look and a new name. And it will show fictional films

Throughout a quarter of a century, One World has shown that cinema is often just the first step on a journey to discover the world around us. Each year, the festival screens dozens of documentaries covering human rights and human rights violations, bringing authentic stories and new perspectives.

For the 2024 edition, the festival has several new features. One World will present a timeless visual identity to the audience and include fictional films with human rights themes. To mark this change, it will also change its name: International Human Rights Film Festival One World. The twenty-sixth edition of the festival will take place from 20 March to 21 April 2024 in more than 40 cities across the Czech Republic.

One World celebrated its twenty-fifth anniversary this year and has grown into the world's largest human rights film festival. Even in its second quarter century, the festival continues to showcase documentaries that move society and post-film debates with guests from all over the world.

One of the most significant changes that the 26th edition of One World will see will be the transformation of the festival's visual identity. No longer will the festival's visuals change from year to year, as they have in the past, but they will take on a new timeless look. This new visual identity and logo will continue to accompany One World for years to come.

"We believe that One World is a sufficiently established brand focused on human rights and deserves a timeless look. Although the visual identity will remain the same for future editions, we will continue to make annual changes to the festival theme. We want to cooperate with leading artists on its modification," says festival director Ondřej Kamenický.

The new visual identity, including the logo, is inspired by the original One World logo, created in 1999. The Earth motif, combined with running human figures, is now replaced by an abstract motif consisting of a square intersected by a circle.

Authors of the new visual identity

The artists behind this design are well-known Czech graphic artists Petr Hrůza and Martin Odehnal. Martin Odehnal has collaborated with leading galleries and museums in the past. He is the co-creator of the visual identity of Zone 8smička, for whose exhibition catalogues he and graphic designer Štěpán Malovec have won the Most Beautiful Book of the Year award in the catalogue category three times. Petr Hrůza is the co-founder and creator of the visual identity of the ArtMap project. Previously, he collaborated with the National Gallery Prague and the Prague City Gallery and has designed several publications and exhibitions.

The change in the visual identity of the 26th edition of One World does not mean an abandonment of the concept of annual themes. However, the festival will continue to open up current social topics—especially in the dynamically changing programme categories.

Fictional films and name changes

Another important novel aspect of the 26th edition of the festival will be the enrichment of the programme. Visitors will be able to look forward not only to the screening of Czech and foreign documentary films but also—for the first time—fictional films. Thematically, feature films will remain within the same framework as the rest of the programme and will focus on human rights. Thus, fictional films will complement the documentaries in the non-competitive thematic categories. However, this new category of films will not come at the cost of documentaries—the number of which will remain the same as in the last two editions.

"Both documentaries and fiction can move audiences to action by showing important topics that should be discussed. At the same time, there is a trend within documentaries to use fiction and fiction techniques to amplify the effect that films have on the viewer. Therefore, the strict division of films into documentary and fiction no longer makes sense in today's festival market," Ondřej Kamenický explains. "We want to focus on art fiction and festival productions, to give space to titles that have been overlooked in the Czech environment and to show feature films from countries where the film industry is not as developed as in Europe," Ondřej adds.

Following the inclusion of fictional films in the festival programme, One World will adapt its official name to this change. From 2024, the festival's name will change to the International Human Rights Film Festival One World.