AegeanDocs International Documentary Film festival is funded by the Regional Development Funds of the North Aegean Region, with the support of University of the Aegean. The materialization of the production has been assigned to the non – profit cultural organization “Historical Documentary”, headed by Kostas Spiropoulos who is also the Artistic Director of AegeanDocs Festival.
The Festival entails social, political and cultural documentaries, confronting history more as an analytical tool of the contemporary society within the dimensions of the present and the past, and less as an academic vocation focusing only in the past. AegeanDocs Festival presents well known and Oscar- awarded creative documentaries of the western culture, but also of “the other side of the border”, that is from countries like Turkey, or regions like Africa or the Middle East. In the next years, AegeanDocs Festival aims to expand its programme to travel documentaries, art documentaries and student films.
The centre of the Festival is an island of the North Aegean sea which changes every year. In 2013 it was the island of Lesvos and its capital, Mytilene. Film screenings, presentations by directors and producers as well as related activities and honorary festivities took place in the island. University of the Aegean offered its net and its live – streaming know how to transmit parts of the festival and its activities to the islands of the North Aegean and other islands of the Aegean sea, wherever it was technically possible.
Apart from offering its personnel and scientific and technical help, University of the Aegean organized the biggest educational program in the history of Greek documentary festivals. For four hours every day, seminars about the film industry and documentaries have been taught by university professors and well known and awarded directors, targeting the general public and all people interested in learning. The seminars have taken place in all the six islands of the North Aegean Sea, wherever there are local branches and offices of the University.
Educational seminars for specific professional groups are organized not only by the University but also by AegeanDocs festival and the non – profit organization “Historical Documentary”. In 2013, the Festival organized seminars for teachers and professors about the use of documentaries as educational tool.
One of the basic targets of AegeanDocs Festival in 2014 is to transform its functions and activities into an international hub of cultural exchanges, providing universities and other cultural and educational foundations in the United States, Australia, Europe and China, with documentaries and other visualized material. Europe needs this international cultural hub that is a major target for AegeanDocs Festival, and can be used as a tool to promote specific forms of targeted cultural tourism in the islands of the North Aegean Sea.