In the mid-19th century, a massive fireplace was the centrepiece of every stately home in England. Children are agile enough to keep the flow of air going in the narrow and dark flues. Their young skin is scraped raw by the sooty stone walls. Their fear of falling is as strong as their fear of the master’s punishment. Black-brown-red cross hatching and unusual camera perspectives bring to life the report of a chimney sweep of the time.

At the turn of 1968/69, the decision was taken to introduce a Leipzig City Express to “relieve inner city traffic as an attractive local passenger transport system”. A forward-looking measure of traffic policy which – at a time when the car-friendly city was still the dominant concept in urban planning – represented an appealing mobility option for the citizens of Leipzig.

The railway from the point of view of people who travel by bicycle, on foot or by car: A Schlager music recording of GDR singer Chris Doerk is re-cut many times to accompany the endless-seeming wait at a railway crossing. Meanwhile, young people find each other, couples form. Even the birth of a child finds a place in this ironic short film.

“Guess what we’re doing! We’re going to practice swimming.” Hanan accompanies her brother to classes in the public pool. The first swimming badge is called the Seahorse, their instructor explains, because it “stands” in the water and doesn’t drown. When Hanan’s family came to Europe in a rubber dinghy, she couldn’t swim. To forget this experience, she learned not to go under in the water – like a seahorse.

Nine-year-old Abuk and 15-year-old Machiek have survived an ordeal. Like many Southern Sudanese children, they were robbed and enslaved by militias. In 2003, after their liberation, they visited Sweden to talk about their experiences. The authentic sound recording expands into animated space and supplies the voiceover for images of fear and memories in children’s colours.

In search of the cat Leo a boy roams through sunny fields. Drifting without a care and digging up treasures in the mysterious darkness of the barn are the last throes of childhood before it ends. The crayon colours of this summer are overlaid with the whispering and rustling of shelter – and a premonition. Mara Cerri and Magda Guidi sharpen our senses for the impressions of a confusing age.

A voice from nowhere proclaims life instructions: “Take a deep breath, say YEEES! … and stop being boring!” But rules and authority gradually elude the anonymous instructor. He becomes a chattering, contradictory flâneur through the universe of his problem-fraught private affairs. Those therapy units have a really sneaky design.

The day begins for father and daughter. They climb beyond their treehouse, glide over and under water, cross blooming landscapes, travel through the air and fly on into space. By ship, bicycle, balloon or on foot. A film about travelling, collecting souvenirs in passing and the question of what’s left at the end of a life.

Overpaintings and scratchings in scenes from the Russian science fiction film “Silver Heads” by Yevgeniy Yufit. Considering that this work is already an outrageous deconstruction of the old Soviet pathos of the inevitable victory of scientific and technical progress, “Stakes” must be regarded as its drug-fuelled exaggeration into the unsurpassable.

Lu and Wei live in a village in rural China. The young girls often go to the nearby river to play or fish with their fathers. The river has a special meaning for them because China’s one-child policy has led to some parents drowning their newborn daughters there. A poetic and touching animation in which Weijia Ma explores the consequences of this tragic chapter in the lives of many Chinese families.

An ingeniously sketched chamber play about the nerve-racking hour before dinner: mother peels vegetables while father is trying to convince their little daughter to take a bath. The protagonists are pretty caricatures of their respective natures, even more so of the roles imposed upon them. An ordinary family – bound together for little good and much evil.

Asude lives in Lower Bavaria. Her grandparents came to Germany from Turkey in the 1970s. She’s currently studying for her school-leaving examinations and, at the same time, training for her dream of becoming a kickboxing champion. Unreservedly supported by her sisters, Asude competes in the European Championship in Skopje. It is her first fight in the jersey of the German national team.

Katharina’s father used to work for the GDR secret service. In the mid-1990s he was arrested for a murder ordered in connection with his former job … and released. Ever since then, Katharina has feared that the doubts about her father’s innocence might throw a shadow on her life, too. A film about family secrets and the question whether some things hadn’t better remain hidden.

Oh, if only the cat could get up the enthusiasm to do what’s natural for her species, namely, to catch mice! But this cat is good for nothing, just lies around languidly, too lazy to even lift a paw. The clever mouse invests more energy. It’s true she doesn’t show herself, but she manages to make everything revolve around her, even to make human and cat leave the house …

Welcome to the Anthropocene. Welcome to an age entirely shaped by humanity’s actions. This multiplayer VR ritual arranges a meeting with Mother Nature. We get the chance to become reconciled with her, re-establish lost connections to the world and re-achieve some harmony with the earth and ourselves.

Covid-19 has made quarantine and self-isolation the everyday experience for many. This project, developed at the CPH:LAB, invites people to scan their most personal places and moments. The resulting VR experience is a walk-in archive and time capsule, the collective memory of a state of emergency which also preserves forgotten virtues like deceleration and the spirit of discovery.