Brown Girls Doc Mafia (BGDM) has introduced the recipients of the 2022-2023 Black Directors Fellowship and Sustainable Artist Fellowship, two new applications that can facilitate the inventive {and professional} improvement of documentary filmmakers by way of grantmaking, mentorship, and curated business connections. The joint cohort of awardees may even obtain a complete of $100,000 in grants, the group revealed in a press launch.
The two fellowships purpose to deal with the gender and racial disparities within the documentary area, which, as BGDM Executive Director Iyabo Boyd factors out, fails to acknowledge the distinctive experiences and wishes of BIPOC ladies and non-binary filmmakers. “The Fellowships will take a holistic approach that considers the entirety and sustainability of their career and long-term future,” stated Boyd.
The applications, beforehand referred to as the BGDM Black Directors and Sustainable Artist Grants, had been reconfigured as fellowships in 2022. “Our focus with this reenvisioning is to emphasize the community building aspect of the program as a way to ensure our Fellows thrive within a sense of intentionally cultivated belonging, purpose, safety, and strength. We believe that these relationships are the seeds that will sow deeper change in the documentary industry over the next twenty years, enabling this ‘great age of documentary’ to be more diverse, equitable, just, and inclusive,” Boyd defined.
Sponsored by the Bertha Foundation, the Black Directors Fellowship helps administrators whose work highlights Black experiences and amplifies Black voices by offering fellows with better visibility, sources, inventive enrichment, {and professional} improvement. Awardees of the Sustainable Artist Fellowship are administrators, producers, editors, and/or DPs distinguished by their distinctive storytelling {and professional} potential, and can obtain mentorship throughout important junctures of their profession. These fellowships will henceforth be run yearly.
The six picks for the Black Directors Fellowship embrace Christine Turner, Nyasha Kadandara, Chelsi Bullard, Brittany Ferrell, Zephrine Royer, and Stephanie Saxemard. In addition, Jia Li, Mars Verrone, Xinyan Yu, Robie Flores, and Jude Chehab had been awarded the Sustainable Artist Fellowship.
“We were taken by the wealth of stories and talent in this year’s applicant pool. The selection process became even more challenging as we recognized the amount of resources still needed to adequately support and compensate the creative work of Black and brown femme and non-binary documentary filmmakers insisting on a more inclusive reality,” the Fellowship Selection jury shared.
BGDM is a collective of BIPOC ladies and non-binary professionals working in documentary filmmaking, pushing for business reform, eradicating limitations to entry, and offering mentorship to their 5000 members and counting. The group works to “disrupt inequity in the film industry by nurturing, amplifying, and investing in the creative capacity and success of our members,” in keeping with their mission assertion.
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