MÁRK SZILÁGYI

Márk Szilágyi was born in Pécs, Hungary in 1984. Fluent in English, German and Hungarian, he holds two citizenships and currently lives in Ludwigsburg, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. Since 2002, after graduating from a bilingual high school (Ungarisch-Deutschsprachiges Schulzentrum, Pécs, Hungary) he enrolled to the University of Siegen, Germany. He holds an MA Degree in Project Management, Studies of Media Planning, developing and consulting. While studying, he developed a strong interest in film making, crowd involvement and democractic Web. His degree dissertation titles ‘Web 2.0Media in NGOs’ and was graded cum laude (2,0). He interned at many Hungarian TV stations (TV2, HirTV) as a reporter and worked at a PR agency (Ferling PR).

In 2008, he declined a PhH offer in Studies on ‘Web 2.0 User Interaction’ and decided to study film production with a Major in Serial Producing at the Filmakademie Baden-Württemberg. In the course of studying he produced numerous movies. Among them the well-acclaimed documentary about a first-time dialogue between former East German Secret Service officers and their victims, Sag mir wo du stehst/Tell Me Where You Stand, sold to German broadcasters (WDR, MDR, Phoenix). Another documentary, Endzeiten/Where Time Stops, about society dropouts, new beginnings, the end of the world and UFOs, was as well very well received and sold to the WDR.

In 2012, he produced the user-generated short Dystopia, supported by the Digital and Innovation Funds by Medien- und Filmgesellschaft (MFG) as well as Medienboard Berlin Brandenburg. The aim was to involve a broad audience in each step of development and production. In the course of this project, Mark got the Innovation Award ‘Kultur- und Kreativpilot”’of the German Federal Government and named as ‘Übermorgenmacher/Tomorrow maker’ of Federal State Baden-Württemberg.

In 2013 he produced the short Pitter Patter Goes My Heart, a co-production of University of Columbia, New York, Filmakademie Vienna, Austria and Filmakademie Baden-Württemberg.

His thesis, REDLAND, is a communist Retro-Sci-Fi cross-media project, aiming to promote freedom of speech and press while portraying a communistic and dystopic future. He produced a pilot webisode (12 Min) and an app prototype, funded by Federal Ministry of Science, Research and Arts (Ministerium für Wissenschaft, Forschung und Kunst Baden-Württemberg).