International Youth Media Summit 2024

This past August Victoria travelled to Zanzibar, Tanzania to participate as an advisor and mentor during this year’s International Youth Media Summit held for the first time in Africa.

The Summit gathers young filmmakers and activists from around the world in a new location every year for the duration of two weeks. During these weeks the delegates are divided into seven groups and each group is given a ‘global issue’ topic which will be at the core of their work and focus throughout the Summit. The seven issues that are the fundamental building blocks of the IYMS are: discrimination, environment, health, poverty, violence, women’s rights and youth empowerment. In their groups, the delegates must together come up with an idea for a short film addressing their issue and work together to complete the film before the end of the Summit.

Victoria was the Youth Advisor for the Poverty team this year and had the absolute pleasure of working with a group of talented, driven and inspiring young filmmakers from Tanzania, the USA and Sweden. There were ups and downs, challenges and setbacks, but also so much creativity, teamwork and learning. Working with locals as actors and finding locations around Zanzibar led to some very valuable interactions and learning experiences about the local culture and customs as a bonus to the creative process of working on a film.

As part of the pre-production phase, the delegates participate in a variation of workshops and seminars about filmmaking to help them get prepared for the work ahead. Victoria led a workshop on ‘Script Analysis & Working with Actors’ where the delegates had a chance to learn about different approaches and many tools they can make use of when working with actors to establish a good connection and communication with them, make their ideas and vision clear and engender a creative and collaborative environment on set.

Victoria was also asked to be the lead in one of the other groups’ film and spent a fun day with them on set on Zanzibar beach.

On August 4th, all of the films created during the Summit were screened at the Old Fort in Zanzibar as part of the Zanzibar International Film Festival. IYMS has been an important part of Victoria’s life since 2017 and she is thrilled to still be able to contribute to the Summit and its vision.