In a big win that underscored the growing prominence of indepedent animation, Gints Zibalodis’ “Flow,” the moving dialog-free tale of a solitary cat’s journey as it learns to survive after a great flood – that was made with open-source software Blender for just $3.

Latvian adventure film Flow has won the Oscar for Best Animated Feature at the 2025 Academy Awards, marking a historic first Oscar win for Latvia, a small nation making its mark on the global stage. This is also a major achievement for Gints Zilbalodis,