The eleventh edition of Animaphix – Nuovi Linguaggi Contemporanei Film Festival will take place from July 29th to August 3rd, 2025, in Bagheria (PA) at the Villa Cattolica – Museo Guttuso. The festival will showcase the best of international auteur animation and present films, exhibitions, talks, meetings, and insights. This edition, in particular, will reflect on diverse themes and aesthetics, with a focus on current scenarios exacerbated by social inequality and dramatic conflicts around the world.
The official opening of Animaphix 2025, scheduled for 9:00 PM on Saturday, July 29th at the Arena di Villa Cattolica, will be performed by Alessandro D’Alessandro, a virtuoso accordionist, producer, and composer whose music blends electronic music with the national pop repertoire, with the concert “Canzoni.” The evening’s guest will be singer-songwriter Peppe Servillo, frontman of Avion Travel.
Over the course of six days, the Festival presents 29 titles from around the world, divided into five competition sections (International, National, Animated Painting, AniDoc, and Experimental). It also highlights the vast body of art and film work by German director Raimund Krumme, who also won the 2025 Renato Guttuso Prize. It also showcases video installations featuring works by Iranian-Canadian independent visual artist and animator Arash Akhgari, as well as films by Italian director Leonardo Carrano.
The Festival dedicates its usual focus on international animated cinema to the representation of the body in Latin American animation, curated by Colombian director Carla Melo Gampert and produced with the collaboration of the Porosa Animación collective and the Instituto Cervantes in Palermo. The Hybrid section examines a selection of films that combine live action and animation. Animare gli archivi (Animate the Archives) explores animations that work with archival materials. For the VR ZONE section, the Festival presents a graphic exhibition inspired by the trailer for this year’s Festival, created by video artist and experimental director Gianluca Abbate, and Dans la grotte (Dans la grotte), a VR work also created by Gianluca Abbate and co-directed by Angelo Cretella. The Festival also focuses on children with workshop activities and book presentations in the ever-present Animakids section. The Festival also showcases its work through the daily talks of the Salotto Monogatari podcast.

“We are proud to host the eleventh edition of Animaphix,” says Filippo Tripoli, Mayor of Bagheria, “a festival that has transformed Bagheria into an international hub for auteur animated cinema. Animaphix is one of our city’s most successful cultural ventures. It’s an event that unites culture, vision, and community, enhancing our region with an increasingly broad and contemporary perspective. As Mayor, I can only be proud: Bagheria continues to be a crossroads of creativity and vision.”

“Animaphix,” says Councilor for Culture Daniele Vella, “represents one of the most significant cultural events for our city: a festival that, through experimental cinema, brings international artists, works distributed at major festivals, and highly topical themes to Bagheria. It’s a project that combines culture, civic engagement, and education, engaging citizens, artists, students, and families, and transforming Bagheria into a vibrant center of reflection and beauty. It’s a legacy that grows year after year, and one that we, as an administration, are happy to support.”

In addition to discussing the Festival’s extensive program, Colla emphasized the role of the local area, its collaborations, and its sponsorships, including that of the Ministry of Culture – Directorate General for Cinema and Audiovisual; the Sicilia Film Commission – which operates within the Department of Tourism, Sport, and Entertainment of the Sicilian Region; the Regional Agency for the Protection of the Environment of Sicily (ARPA Sicilia); the Cervantes Institute of Palermo; the Council of Arts and Letters of the Ministry of Culture and Communications of Quebec; the Quebec Delegation in Rome; the Polish Institute of Rome; and the Municipality of Bagheria. The complete festival program is available on the website:
Animaphix New Contemporary Languages Film Festival
The full recording of the conference will be published on the Municipality’s YouTube channel at 3:30 PM today, July 22, and shared on the municipal and festival social media channels.