Photo Credits: Karel Cudlín
Andrea Slováková is a documentary filmmaker, curator, and film theoretician. Since May 2020, she is a dean of Film and TV School of Academy of Performing Arts in Prague (FAMU). She obtained her doctoral degrees in Film Science at Charles University’s Faculty of Arts and in Media Studies at the same University’s Faculty of Social Sciences, respectively. Studied documentary film at FAMU and strategic management at Cambridge Business School. Has been teaching the theory and history of documentary and experimental cinema at Czech tertiary schools. Was involved in the leadership of the Ji.hlava International Documentary Film Festival and still works as the event’s dramaturge. Publishes articles on cinema in various periodicals and used to be the editor-in-chief of the dok.revue magazine and the DO documentary film almanac. Used to helm the NAMU publishing house and co-founded Nová beseda. She has made a film portrait of mathematician Petr Vopěnka, a film on clouds, and a film essay on surveillance mechanisms.
Maythem spent his formative years in Iraq before fleeing with his family into exile. He has many years’ experience creating award-winning film and photography projects. His films have been selected for major international film festivals, broadcasted, distributed in cinemas and won many accolades and prizes. He also made films in English & Arabic for BBC World Service and ART Europe. Maythem wrote IRAQI TALES, a body of stories for film, at the University of Oxford and then at the National Film & Television School (UK). From this DRIFTING ON THE WIND was chosen by over 20 international film festivals, winning the Director’s Award at Hearts & Minds. Following this, AL-BAGHDADI won the Gold Prize for Best Foreign Language Film at the International Filmmaker Festival. ALI AND HIS MIRACLE SHEEP, his latest installment from IRAQI TALES had its world premiere and won the prestigious Best Film Award at Sheffield Doc Fest UK Competition 2021 and has since been selected by over 40 major international festivals, winning over 20 awards and distinctions. Maythem’s photographic work has been published and exhibited in several one-man shows and joint exhibitions of award-winning projects such as AL-INTITHAR, INTERFACE and the more recent MY CAMERA IN EXILE collections. Winner of Al Hambra Award for Excellence in the Arts, Maythem works with a diverse range of international projects as well as leading workshops and masterclasses in filmmaking and photography. After the Iraqi Cultural Centre (UK) held an exhibition of his work in London, he began the development of his successfully published photo book, BEYOND MOMENTS : MOROCCO. Maythem is currently working on several new film and photography projects including 40 YEARS OF SILENCE and TEAR MAKER which is set against the backdrop of the Iraqi desert.
Artistic director and programmer and curator at MIDBO (International Documentary Film Festival of Bogotá) in Colombia, member of ALADOS and adjunct Professor in the Department of Audiovisual Media at TecnoCampus ESUPT, Universitat Pompeu Fabra). Researcher of the group Narratives of Resistance, co-coordinator of the HoMER Network (History of moviegoing exhibition and reception). Coeditor with Pablo Mora and Daniela Samper of the book Territorio y memoria sin fronteras, nuevas estrategias para pensar lo real (2021) and author of the chapter Sur on Demand in the collective book Cines latinoamericanos, en busca del público perdido (2020), edited by Ana Rosas Mantecón and Leandro González awarded best essay in 2020 by Fundación de Cine Latinoamericano in La Habana.
Paulo Cunha is a programmer of the Guimarães Film Club, the international film festival Curtas Vila do Conde and the Batalha Centro de Cinema. He has been a jury member at several film festivals (IndieLisboa, Caminhos do Cinema Português, CineEco, Filminho) and in artistic and scientific scholarship competitions (Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, FilmaPorto or Foundation for Science and Technology). Professor of cinema at the University of Beira Interior, where he directs the Masters Degree in Cinema, he is also Vice-President of the Department of Arts and an integrated member of the Group of Arts of LabCom – Comunicação e Artes. PhD in Contemporary Studies from the University of Coimbra, he is also coordinator of the Working Group on Post-Colonial Cinemas and Peripherals of AIM – Association of Researchers of the Moving Image. His most recent publications are A New History of New Portuguese Cinema (2018, Outro Modo/Le Monde Diplomatique) and Reframing Portuguese Cinema in the 21st Century (2020, Curtas Metragens CRL; co-edited with Daniel Ribas).
Waldir Xavier studied Journalism, Philosophy and Cinema. Having settled in France for the last 15 years, he graduated as an Image Editor and specialized in Sound Design, having worked with directors such as Youssef Chahine, Pedro Costa, João Botelho, Raoul Peck and Eryk Rocha and directed the documentary “Barracão, a carnival gaze” where he follows the backstage work in preparation for a parade at a samba school in Rio de Janeiro. Among his best-known works as a sound editor are “Central Station” by Walter Salles, Golden Bear at the Berlin Festival in 1998, “From Afar”, by Lorenzo Vigas, Golden Lion at the Venice Festival in 2015 and “The Invisible Life of Eurídice Gusmão”, by Karim Aïnouz, Un Certain Regard Prize at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival.
