SPIRIT SEAM

Ashley Gerst is a 2D and 3D animator living in Brooklyn NY. She holds a BFA in Digital Arts from the Cleveland Institute of Art and an MFA in Computer Art from the School of Visual Arts. In addition to her professorial work at William Paterson, Ashley is a freelance animator working for a variety of production companies and clients in the Greater New York City area. She has created animation and VFX for broadcast commercials, TV shows, and documentaries for AMC, VH1, and BET. Some of her clients include Fast Company, Behance, Credit Suisse, Nivea, Nissan, Afrin, Red Bull, Hudson Media, CBS, Nurturing Press, iNomadics, RedwoodLiving and more.

OshKiKiShiKaw: A NEW DAY

Born in Moose Factory. Ontario, Jules Koostachin was raised by her Cree speaking grandparents in Moosonee, and her mother in Ottawa, a warrior of the Canadian Residential school system. She
is a band member of Attawapiskat First Nation. She currently resides in Vancouver where she is a PhD candidate with the Institute of Gender, Race, Sexuality, and Social Justice at the University of British Columbia, focusing on Indigenous documentary. This is her fourth year
with CASCADIA.

KAKSI RUUMISTA RANNALLA / TWO BODIES ON A BEACH (2020)

CONTROL

Abby Dunn is a documentary director with a master’s in Documentary Directing from AFTRS. She has won numerous scholarships and fellowships that have taken her to create films in places such as Mexico, Cambodia, Indonesia and Singapore. Recently, she won the ACCESS prize at the Australian International Documentary Conference. Dunn is currently in post-production for her next film and is based in Italy and Australia.

#3 NORMANDY LANE

Brenda Strong is best known for her seminal (acting and voice) portrayal of Mary Alice Young on “Desperate Housewives,” but this two-time Emmy-nominated and SAG Award-winning actress has had a long and endearing film and television career. In addition to acting and directing, she is also a producer, notably on the award-winning documentary “Fallen,” which looks at the human side of line-of-duty police deaths.

SPACE NEEDLE

TUMBLING TOWARDS HOME

Imelda O’Reilly is an independent Irish filmmaker from Kildare. Her award-winning short films and feature screenplay have been represented at over 50 film festivals internationally around the world, including Cannes Film Festival, Rhode Island International Film Festival, and Cinequest Film & Creativity Film Festival. She is the recipient of a Fulbright Fellowship to Morocco, where her film Bricks, Beds and Sheep’s Heads was a Regional Finalist for the Student Academy Awards. O’Reilly appeared in the 2019 CASCADIA Film Festival with her short, “Eggs and Soldiers” (2016).

LA TRACTION DES POLES / MAGNETIC HARVEST  

Marine Levéel studied in a fine arts school where she practiced photography, video, and sculpture. She attended film school where she directed short movies as a student. She also worked on independent films as assistant director and set designer. Now she dedicates herself fully to screenwriting and filming. In her work, she combines observation of reality and impression. “Magnetic Harvest” is her first professional short film produced by Apaches Films.

GUARDIAN 

CHALK OF CHAMPIONS

Jackie Omanoff, a Brooklyn-based storyteller who began as a producer in the advertising industry, currently works at CNN’s “Great Big Story.” She has received a number of awards while producing at the media company including a Silver Cannes Lion, Digital Drum Award, and Vimeo Staff pick.

STUD BOOB

Shaina Feinberg, a filmmaker from Manhattan, is currently directing the second season of her digital series “Dinette”—the first season of which played at the Tribeca Film Festival and was featured in The New Yorker. She is developing projects for the scripted podcast space, feature films, and co-writing a book for a major publisher. She is also a New York Times columnist and has been featured on NPR. Her award-winning feature “The Babymooners” blurred the lines between documentary and fiction to examine gender stereotypes and has played at film festivals all over the country.

VARIABLES

UNSPOKEN CODE

Jen Schwerin is an award-winning filmmaker working in the U.S. and China. In the U.S., her award-winning feature documentary, “Talking Trash,” which screened at festivals and aired on PBS. Her Emmy nominated short film, “The Vessel,” aired on PBS and screened at festivals. While living in China for 24 years, Schwerin created the first Chinese short films for MTV. She is currently developing a pilot for television.

FUGUE

Laura Neri, half Greek, half Italian filmmaker born in Belgium, studied film and screenwriting at the Free University of Brussels and earned her MFA in Film Directing at USC. Neri wrote and directed several award-winning short films including, “A Kiss on the Nose,” which screened at more than 50 festivals and received multiple awards. Her first feature film “Kill the Habit” earned her a “Best Feature Director” award at La Femme film festival in LA.

A NORMAL GIRL

DRIVING LESSONS

Marziyeh Riahi was born in Tehran, Iran. She is Editor in Chief of Short Film News, a website specializing in short films and documentaries in Asia that was established in 2004. She graduated with a degree in Cinema from the University of Applied Science and Technology, Tehran, and in Film Directing from the Iranian Young Cinema Society, Tehran. Also she is a member of The Network For Promotion of Asian & Asia Pacific Cinema and of the Iranian Society of Film Critics & Writers. “Driving Lessons” is her first short film.

DOM

Meryl Jones Williams is a filmmaker and actress residing in Brooklyn. As a filmmaker, “Biophilia,” a film she co-produced and played the lead, premiered this year at Citizen Jane, Brooklyn, Northbend, Indiefest, and Middlecoast and just celebrated its online premiere on Vimeo’s curated channel “Ladies with Lenses” and “Women and Hollywood.” She is currently in development for her first feature as a writer/director as well as developing “Dom” the short into a sister feature to direct in 2020.

RICCARDO THAT BOUNCED ON TO THE STARS 

HALWA

Gayatri Bajpai is director of the short films “Muck” (2014), “Housewarming” (2017), and “Rio” (2017). She is a two-time UCLA Directors’ Spotlight Winner of Best Documentary for “Muck” in 2014 and Best Comedy for “Housewarming” in 2016. Bajpai is also co-directing a portrait documentary short with Niray Bhakta (her co-director on “Halwa”) about a Mexican trans woman who was human trafficked by a drug cartel into sex slavery.

CONCERNING CONTRACEPTION

Sandy Jeglum is a documentary filmmaker with over a decade of experience editing and producing short and feature-length films. Jeglum focuses on telling stories that support gender equity, including web shorts for KIVA (2013), Foundation for Women (2013), and America Rise (in-production). She holds a master’s with distinction in Documentary Production from the University of the West of England. “Concerning Contraception” is her directorial debut.

BLOOD & GLORY

RED SNOW

Marie Clements’ independent media production company specializes in innovative works that explore an Indigenous and intercultural reality. “Red Snow” has won several awards, including Most Popular Canadian Feature Film at the Vancouver International Film Festival, Best Canadian Feature Film at the Edmonton International Film Festival, and won Best Director of a Feature Film at the 2019 American Indian Film Festival (AIFF) in San Francisco.

THE SHALLOW END

Cynthia Silver is a New York City-based stage and film director and an acting teacher who was one of 10 filmmakers selected to participate in the 2019 Through Her Lens: The Tribeca Chanel Women’s Filmmaker Program. Silver trained at New York City’s Atlantic Acting School where she is now a faculty member and earned her BFA from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts.

DOM

QUEEN OF HEARTS: AUDREY FLACK

Deborah Shaffer has been making social issue documentaries since the early 1970s. In the 1980s, she directed the Oscar-winning short, “Witness to War: Dr. Charlie Clements,” and the Emmy-nominated “Fire from the Mountain,” which both aired on PBS. In 2001, she directed two shows for the PBS series “Art 21: Art in the 21st Century.” She also co-directed and wrote “Rwanda: Ladies First” for WNET’s “Wide Angle” and was awarded an Emmy in 2004. In 2016, she co-executive produced “Very Semi-Serious,” an HBO Emmy-award winning documentary about New Yorker cartoonists.

SHEEP, WOLF, AND A CUP OF TEA