Concept
Diversity as an educational concept for artists and filmmakers.
The Academy of Media Arts Cologne (KHM) and the Audiovisual Media degree course.
The Academy of Media Arts Cologne (KHM) was founded in 1990. Since then it has offered an educational concept, unique within Germany, which brings film, art and science together in one degree course: Media and Fine Art (since summer 2011, before this called Audiovisual Media). As such the KHM is an art school with a focus on media, and a film school that sees its origins in the artistic moving image.
The course of study fosters concurrent engagement in various skills, so that students gain knowledge in a wide range of practical and artistic disciplines. The stage one imparts the basics of theory and artistic practise. The stage two, along with postgraduate or further education courses, then concentrate on individual specialisations in artistic disciplines such as photography, feature film, documentary and experimental film, camera, directing, scriptwriting, animation, video and light art, media design, media scenography, experimental computer sciences, sound, sculpture, and public art.
This practise-oriented study is supplemented by theoretical seminars and lectures, for example on the aesthetics and history of the arts and media. The ateliers, studios and labs of the KHM where the students work are equipped with high quality equipment, reflecting the diversity of the fields of study and current developments in media technology.
Since 2004, the KHM has also been able to offer Ph.D courses and 2009 saw the launch of the ‘Artefakte’ (‘artefacts’) doctoral programme, aimed at encouraging research into new issues and questions exposed by artistic and media practise.
The KHM admits around 330 students a year. Study is supervised by an international team of professors and assistants as well as a network of fellows and guest lecturers, and additional support is provided through on-going cooperation with colleges and academies, both within Germany and internationally, cultural institutions, festivals, exhibition organisers and companies within the media and film branch. This also prepares the ground for the building of networks and activities in the broad field of arts and media that students work in after graduating. This field ranges from successful film directors, cinematographers, scriptwriters to artists, programmers, designers and producers, working both independently and in collectives.
Public events such as the ‘Best of KHM’ series, which presents debut films by KHM graduates, the ‘Nocturnes’ concert series with guests or productions from the sound lab, various lecture series or the program of exhibitions in the ‘glasmoog’ place current KHM productions within the local, national and international context. The academy opens its doors to the public at the end of each summer semester with its ‘Rundgang’; every April a selection of students take part in Art Cologne; in October the KHM organises the annual ‘Showcase’, a presentation of current film productions and scripts to the film industry; every November the KHM, in cooperation with the Westdeutschen Rundfunk (WDR, West German Broadcasting), presents ‘kurzundschön’, an international competition for young talent with the categories advertising film, motion design, short film, mobile miniatures, WDR special category, Avid special prize for the best editing and the Choice prize for a KHM film. Over the next two years students will be showing ‘Arbeiten aus dem Medienlabor’ (‘Work from the media lab’) as part of the ‘Echoraum’ (‘Echo Chamber’) exhibition at the Art and Exhibition Hall in Bonn. In addition, the KHM festival office organises and supports the participation of student films at a variety of festivals: for example, the Max Ophüls Festival, the Festival of Animated Film in Stuttgart, the International Short Film Festival in Oberhausen, the Hof International Film Festival, the Berlinale and a multitude of student festivals.