French filmmakers Anouk Moyaux and Huiqin Li won the first Europumpeli at the Oulu Music Video Festival on 29 August 2026 for Glox Olia’s Lluvia de Ceniza, a hand-processed black-and-white 16mm work in which scratched surfaces draw sound, light and image into the same haunted field.
The award was announced at Saturday evening’s Pumpeligaala in Oulu, Finland. The organiser’s post-event results named the directing pair as winners of the festival’s inaugural European competition, while Kaleva independently confirmed the ceremony and result. The decision gives a newly created continental prize to a work grounded in tactile analogue craft rather than seamless digital polish.
Analogue craft opens a European chapter
The jury focused on the way Lluvia de Ceniza makes its materials active. Scratches become visual and sonic texture, light establishes a horizon, and an indirect narrative gradually reveals the work’s emotional centre. Its handmade process does not read as nostalgia: the judges found the combination of picture, sound and feeling distinctly contemporary.
Listed as a French 2026 production, the video translates its title as Rain of Ash. Its monochrome surface makes physical intervention visible rather than hiding it. That material presence matters in a form often designed for rapid circulation, where the production process can disappear behind a finished digital image.
That choice emerged from a substantial field. The European competition received 161 submissions and selected 14 finalists. Eligibility extended across the European Union and European Economic Area, as well as the United Kingdom, Switzerland, Georgia and Ukraine. The programme was created as part of Oulu’s European Capital of Culture year and expanded the festival’s international reach after its Nordic competition.
The prize included a Europumpeli object designed by artist Toivo Heinimäki and a pair of Genelec studio monitors valued at about €8,000. More important editorially, the new award gives music-video makers a European platform inside a festival founded in 1994 and dedicated to treating the form as audiovisual culture rather than only as music promotion.
A wider field for music-video culture
The gala also mapped the strength of Finland’s domestic field. Ida-Maria Olva received the Golden Pumpeli for Olva’s Keijut ja perhoset, while Seena Talvi earned the Teen Pumpeli for directing Turisti’s Leipää. Awards for cinematography and post-production went to Annika Miettinen for Alma Alanko’s Ilmaa and Juha Ilmari Laine for Laura Hynninen’s Lammella respectively.
The inaugural European result sharpened a contrast already present in this year’s selection. In its competition preview, OMVF placed 16mm film alongside experiments with artificial intelligence, and connected personal memory with war, political resistance, queer joy and digital disorder. Choosing Lluvia de Ceniza put emphasis on what physical handling can still contribute to an image made for screens.
For Moyaux, Li and Glox Olia, the first Europumpeli marks a specific achievement. For OMVF, it opens a new chapter: a Finnish festival with a long domestic history now has a framework through which European music-video practice can be compared, debated and rewarded.
Image credit: official OMVF 2026 awards graphic, Oulu August Festivals, used under the organiser’s media-use permission. The graphic does not reproduce the winning video.