Solidarity is a Verb

“Solidarity is a Verb” is a screening and discussion programme providing insights into experiences of solidarity between WET and Freefilmers, and their wider networks. We will start by presenting Centre for Creativity (Marta Hryniuk & Nick Thomas of WET) and A Home for Rita [pre-premiere] (Yulia Appen of Freefilmers) to initiate a conversation about filmmaking as an expression of, and tool for, solidarity: an interconnected web of relationships and actions.

A Home for Rita (2025) intimately portrays a family of Roma IDPs (internally displaced people) in eastern Ukraine as they try to build a new life after their homes were lost to Russian occupation. The film was made over many months, through the sharing of life experiences and struggles, and reflects the friendship and relationships of mutual care between the director and her protagonists. Centre for Creativity (2024) depicts the Ukrainian ‘home front’ of the war against Russian aggression, specifically women who organise and resist the ongoing invasion. Notably, we hear the voice of Margarita Polovinko, an artist, volunteer, combat medic, and soldier, who was killed on the front line in April 2025. Margarita was also closely involved in ‘Medychka’, a fundraising campaign for first aid and medical equipment co-organised by WET and Freefilmers. Taking the two films as starting points, we will speak about WET and Freefilmers’ collaborations on film and volunteer projects, and the networks of solidarity that they have been weaving since the beginning of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine.