1.
Kursaal Congress Centre and Auditorium
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The Kursaal Congress Centre and Auditorium is a complex comprising several spaces, a great auditorium, many-use halls and exhibition halls. It was designed by Spanish architect Rafael Moneo, and is located in Donostia-San Sebastián, the absence of any architectonic structure in such a privileged site for so many years was remarkable. At the time the old palace was pulled down, a competition was held to find a replacement, however, the winning project was never constructed due to its complexity. A new project proposal was submitted in 1972, after a few changes to the design, building work was started in 1975, but after the perimeter wall was complete and the foundations in place, works was halted. The plot of land passed from private hands to public hands. Of the six projects, the one of Moneo was chosen, after the project was written down between 1991 and 1994, the works were begun in 1996, and were not finished until 1999. During this period some funding problems arose, mainly because of the refusal of the Basque Government to increase the funds. After these problems were solved, the works were concluded in 1999. The Kursaal Congress Centre was designed by Rafael Moneo, the initial impact of the buildings in the Donostia landscape was deemed negative by Donostians, the curved sandstone buildings clashed with a sharp-edged crystal structure. The significance of the building was eclipsed by the parallel construction of the Guggenheim museum in Bilbao. It is mainly constituted as two large volumes, that emerge from a platform. Each cube, is formed by a prismatic structure, surrounded by double translucent glass panels. Between the cubes there is a big walkable surface, with sights to the Zurriola Beach, various concerts of the Donostia Jazz Festival, and many other events, take place in that terrace. Kursaal Auditorium Placed inside the biggest cube, this auditorium can hold an audience of 1,800, the first seat rows can be removed to make room for the orchestra in an opera. Chamber Hall This seats 600 people, and is placed in the small cube and it is used for congresses or smaller concerts. Multiple-use rooms These are used for a variety of events for more limited audiences, exhibition halls The halls are used for housing galleries and other exhibitions. Kubo Hall It is an exhibition hall under the supervision of the Kutxa savings bank, moreover, the building has a restaurant owned by Martín Berasategui, various shops in its basement, and a car park
2.
Basque Country (autonomous community)
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The Basque Country is an autonomous community of northern Spain. It includes the Basque provinces of Álava, Biscay and Gipuzkoa, the Basque Country or Basque Autonomous Community was granted the status of nationality within Spain, attributed by the Spanish Constitution of 1978. The term Basque Country may also refer to the cultural region, the home of the Basque people. The territory has three areas, which are defined by the two parallel ranges of the Basque Mountains. The main range of forms the watershed between the Atlantic and Mediterranean basins. The highest point of the range is in the Aizkorri massif, the three areas are, Formed by many valleys with short rivers that flow from the mountains to the Bay of Biscay, like the Nervión, Urola or Oria. The coast is rough, with cliffs and small inlets. The main features of the coast are the Bilbao Abra Bay and the Estuary of Bilbao, the Urdaibai estuary, between the two mountain ranges, the area is occupied mainly by a high plateau called Llanada Alavesa, where the capital Gasteiz is located. The rivers flow south from the mountains to the Ebro River, the main rivers are the Zadorra River and Bayas River. From the southern mountains to the Ebro is the so-called Rioja Alavesa, some of Spains production of Rioja wine takes place here. Precipitation average is about 1200 mm, the middle section is more influence by the continental climate, but with a varying degree of the northern oceanic climate. This gives warm, dry summers and cold, snowy winters, the Ebro valley has a pure continental climate, winters are cold and dry and summers very warm and dry, with precipitation peaking in spring and autumn. Precipitation is scarce and irregular, as low as 300 mm, almost half of the 2,155,546 inhabitants of the Basque Autonomous Community live in Greater Bilbao, Bilbaos metropolitan area. Of the ten most populous cities, six form part of Bilbaos conurbation, with 28. 2% of the Basque population born outside this region, immigration is crucial to Basque demographics. Over the 20th century most of this came from other parts of Spain, typically from Galicia or Castile. Over recent years, sizeable numbers of population have returned to their birthplaces and most immigration to the Basque country now comes from abroad. Roman Catholicism is, by far, the largest religion in Basque Country, bilbao-Bilbo Vitoria-Gasteiz San Sebastián-Donostia Barakaldo Getxo Irun Portugalete Santurtzi Basauri Errenteria Spanish and Basque are co-official in all territories of the autonomous community. The Basque-speaking areas in the autonomous community are set against the wider context of the Basque language, spoken to the east in Navarre
3.
Golden Shell
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The Golden Shell is the highest prize given to a competing film at the San Sebastián Film Festival. In 1953 and 1954, the highest prize had been called the Gran Premio, in 1955 and 1956 it was replaced by the Silver Shell. *denotes first win for a nation Official website San Sebastián International Film Festival at the Internet Movie Database
4.
Spanish language
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Spanish —also called Castilian —is a Romance language that originated in the Castile region of Spain, with hundreds of millions of native speakers around the world. It is usually considered the worlds second-most spoken native language after Mandarin Chinese and it is one of the few languages to use inverted question and exclamation marks. Spanish is a part of the Ibero-Romance group of languages, which evolved from several dialects of Vulgar Latin in Iberia after the collapse of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century. Beginning in the early 16th century, Spanish was taken to the colonies of the Spanish Empire, most notably to the Americas, as well as territories in Africa, Oceania, around 75% of modern Spanish is derived from Latin. Greek has also contributed substantially to Spanish vocabulary, especially through Latin, Spanish vocabulary has been in contact from an early date with Arabic, having developed during the Al-Andalus era in the Iberian Peninsula. With around 8% of its vocabulary being Arabic in origin, this language is the second most important influence after Latin and it has also been influenced by Basque as well as by neighboring Ibero-Romance languages. It also adopted words from languages such as Gothic language from the Visigoths in which many Spanish names and surnames have a Visigothic origin. Spanish is one of the six languages of the United Nations. It is the language in the world by the number of people who speak it as a mother tongue, after Mandarin Chinese. It is estimated more than 437 million people speak Spanish as a native language. Spanish is the official or national language in Spain, Equatorial Guinea, speakers in the Americas total some 418 million. In the European Union, Spanish is the tongue of 8% of the population. Spanish is the most popular second language learned in the United States, in 2011 it was estimated by the American Community Survey that of the 55 million Hispanic United States residents who are five years of age and over,38 million speak Spanish at home. The Spanish Constitution of 1978 uses the term castellano to define the language of the whole Spanish State in contrast to las demás lenguas españolas. Article III reads as follows, El castellano es la lengua española oficial del Estado, las demás lenguas españolas serán también oficiales en las respectivas Comunidades Autónomas. Castilian is the official Spanish language of the State, the other Spanish languages as well shall be official in their respective Autonomous Communities. The Spanish Royal Academy, on the hand, currently uses the term español in its publications. Two etymologies for español have been suggested, the Spanish Royal Academy Dictionary derives the term from the Provençal word espaignol, and that in turn from the Medieval Latin word Hispaniolus, from—or pertaining to—Hispania
5.
Basque language
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Basque is the language spoken by the Basques. Linguistically, Basque is unrelated to the languages of Europe and indeed, as a language isolate. The Basques are indigenous to, and primarily inhabit, the Basque Country, the Basque language is spoken by 27% of Basques in all territories. Of these, 93% are in the Spanish area of the Basque Country, native speakers live in a contiguous area that includes parts of four Spanish territories and the three ancient provinces in France. However, in those Basque-speaking regions that supported the uprising the Basque language was more than merely tolerated, overall, in the 1960s and later, the trend reversed and education and publishing in Basque began to flourish. As a part of process, a standardized form of the Basque language. Besides its standardised version, the five historic Basque dialects are Biscayan, Gipuzkoan, and Upper Navarrese in Spain and they take their names from the historic Basque provinces, but the dialect boundaries are not congruent with province boundaries. Euskara Batua was created so that Basque language could be easily understood by all Basque speakers—in formal situations. In both Spain and France, the use of Basque for education varies from region to region, a language isolate, Basque is believed to be one of the few surviving pre-Indo-European languages in Europe, and the only one in Western Europe. Basque has adopted a good deal of its vocabulary from the Romance languages, the Basque alphabet uses the Latin script. In Basque, the name of the language is officially Euskara, three etymological theories of the name Euskara are taken seriously by linguists and Vasconists. In French, the language is normally called basque, though in recent times euskara has become common, Spanish has a greater variety of names for the language. Today, it is most commonly referred to as el vasco, la lengua vasca, both terms, vasco and basque, are inherited from Latin ethnonym Vascones, which in turn goes back to the Greek term οὐασκώνους, an ethnonym used by Strabo in his Geographica. The Spanish term Vascuence, derived from Latin vasconĭce, has acquired negative connotations over the centuries and is not well-liked amongst Basque speakers generally, Basque is geographically surrounded by Romance languages but is a language isolate unrelated to them. It is the last remaining descendant of one of the languages of Western Europe. Consequently, its prehistory may not be reconstructible by means of the comparative method except by applying it to differences between dialects within the language. Little is known of its origins, but a form of the Basque language likely was present in Western Europe before the arrival of the Indo-European languages to the area. Others find this unlikely, see the aizkora controversy, Latin inscriptions in Gallia Aquitania preserve a number of words with cognates in the reconstructed proto-Basque language, for instance, the personal names Nescato and Cison
6.
FIAPF
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The FIAPF based in Paris, created in 1933, is an organization composed with 36 member associations from 30 of the leading audiovisual production countries. FIAPF is also in charge of regulating international film festivals, including some of the worlds most important ones. z. w, the FIAPF categorizes the film festivals as Competitive, Competitive Specialised, Non-Competitive and Documentary/Short Film. The following film festivals have been given competitive status by the FIAPF, Toronto / Toronto International Film Festival Vienna / Vienna International Film Festival The following film festivals are for documentary and short films
7.
Film festival
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A film festival is an organised, extended presentation of films in one or more cinemas or screening venues, usually in a single city or region. Increasingly, film festivals show some films outdoors, films may be of recent date and, depending upon the festivals focus, can include international and domestic releases. Some festivals focus on a specific film-maker or genre or subject matter, a number of film festivals specialise in short films of a defined maximum length. Film festivals are annual events. Some film historians do not consider Film Festivals as official releases of film, the Venice Film Festival is the oldest major festival. The Melbourne International Film Festival is the largest film festival in the Southern Hemisphere, the San Sebastián International Film Festival is one of the most important and oldest film festivals in Europe. It was at this festival where the worldwide first release of North by Northwest was showed, Raindance Film Festival is the UKs largest celebration of independent film-making, and takes place in London in October. Australias first and longest running festival is the Melbourne International Film Festival. Edinburgh International Film Festival is the longest running festival in Great Britain, North Americas first and longest running short film festival is the Yorkton Film Festival, established in 1947. The first film festival in the United States was the Columbus International Film & Video Festival, also known as The Chris Awards and it was followed four years later by the San Francisco International Film Festival, held in March 1957, which emphasized feature-length dramatic films. The festival played a role in introducing foreign films to American audiences. Films in the first year included Akira Kurosawas Throne of Blood, Film festival dedicated to honoring music in film. Digital feature film began in 2005, along with the worlds first online film festival. Unlike other arts nonprofits, film festivals typically receive few donations from the public and are occasionally organized as nonprofit business associations instead of public charities. Film industry members often have significant curatorial input, and corporate sponsors are given opportunities to promote their brand to festival audiences in exchange for cash contributions, private parties, often to raise investments for film projects, constitute significant fringe events. Larger festivals maintain year-round staffs often engaging in community and charitable projects outside festival season, on the other hand, some festivals—usually those accepting fewer films, and perhaps not attracting as many big names in their audiences as do Sundance and Telluride—require no entry fee. Rotterdam Film Festival, Mumbai Film Festival, and many film festivals in the United States, are examples. The Portland International Film Festival charges a fee, but waives it for filmmakers from the Northwestern United States
8.
Spain
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By population, Spain is the sixth largest in Europe and the fifth in the European Union. Spains capital and largest city is Madrid, other urban areas include Barcelona, Valencia, Seville, Bilbao. Modern humans first arrived in the Iberian Peninsula around 35,000 years ago, in the Middle Ages, the area was conquered by Germanic tribes and later by the Moors. Spain is a democracy organised in the form of a government under a constitutional monarchy. It is a power and a major developed country with the worlds fourteenth largest economy by nominal GDP. Jesús Luis Cunchillos argues that the root of the span is the Phoenician word spy. Therefore, i-spn-ya would mean the land where metals are forged, two 15th-century Spanish Jewish scholars, Don Isaac Abravanel and Solomon ibn Verga, gave an explanation now considered folkloric. Both men wrote in two different published works that the first Jews to reach Spain were brought by ship by Phiros who was confederate with the king of Babylon when he laid siege to Jerusalem. This man was a Grecian by birth, but who had given a kingdom in Spain. He became related by marriage to Espan, the nephew of king Heracles, Heracles later renounced his throne in preference for his native Greece, leaving his kingdom to his nephew, Espan, from whom the country of España took its name. Based upon their testimonies, this eponym would have already been in use in Spain by c.350 BCE, Iberia enters written records as a land populated largely by the Iberians, Basques and Celts. Early on its coastal areas were settled by Phoenicians who founded Western Europe´s most ancient cities Cadiz, Phoenician influence expanded as much of the Peninsula was eventually incorporated into the Carthaginian Empire, becoming a major theater of the Punic Wars against the expanding Roman Empire. After an arduous conquest, the peninsula came fully under Roman Rule, during the early Middle Ages it came under Germanic rule but later, much of it was conquered by Moorish invaders from North Africa. In a process took centuries, the small Christian kingdoms in the north gradually regained control of the peninsula. The last Moorish kingdom fell in the same year Columbus reached the Americas, a global empire began which saw Spain become the strongest kingdom in Europe, the leading world power for a century and a half, and the largest overseas empire for three centuries. Continued wars and other problems led to a diminished status. The Napoleonic invasions of Spain led to chaos, triggering independence movements that tore apart most of the empire, eventually democracy was peacefully restored in the form of a parliamentary constitutional monarchy. Spain joined the European Union, experiencing a renaissance and steady economic growth
9.
Vertigo (film)
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Vertigo is a 1958 American film noir psychological thriller film directed and produced by Alfred Hitchcock. The story was based on the 1954 novel Dentre les morts by Boileau-Narcejac, the screenplay was written by Alec Coppel and Samuel A. Taylor. The film stars James Stewart as former police detective John Scottie Ferguson, Scottie is forced into early retirement because an incident in the line of duty has caused him to develop acrophobia and vertigo. Scottie is hired by an acquaintance, Gavin Elster, as an investigator to follow Gavins wife Madeleine. The film was shot on location in San Francisco, California and it is the first film to use the dolly zoom, an in-camera effect that distorts perspective to create disorientation, to convey Scotties acrophobia. As a result of its use in film, the effect is often referred to as the Vertigo effect. Vertigo received mixed reviews upon release, but is now often cited as a classic Hitchcock film. Attracting significant scholarly criticism, it replaced Citizen Kane as the best film made in the 2012 British Film Institutes Sight & Sound critics poll. In 1996, the film underwent a restoration to create a new 70mm print. It has appeared repeatedly in polls of the best films by the American Film Institute, after a rooftop chase, where his fear of heights and vertigo result in the death of a policeman, San Francisco detective John Scottie Ferguson retires. Scottie tries to conquer his fear, but his friend and ex-fiancée Midge Wood says that another severe emotional shock may be the only cure. An acquaintance from college, Gavin Elster, asks Scottie to follow his wife, Madeleine and he watches her enter the McKittrick Hotel, but on investigation she does not seem to be there. Gavin reveals that Carlotta is Madeleines great-grandmother, although Madeleine has no knowledge of this, Scottie tails Madeleine to Fort Point and, when she leaps into the bay, he rescues her. The next day Scottie follows Madeleine, they meet and spend the day together and they travel to Muir Woods and Cypress Point on 17-Mile Drive, where Madeleine runs down towards the ocean. Scottie grabs her and they embrace, Madeleine recounts a nightmare and Scottie identifies its setting as Mission San Juan Bautista, childhood home of Carlotta. He drives her there and they express their love for each other, Madeleine suddenly runs into the church and up the bell tower. Scottie, halted on the steps by his acrophobia, sees Madeleine plunge to her death, the death is declared a suicide. Gavin does not fault Scottie, but Scottie breaks down, becomes depressed and is in a sanatorium
