UK

Mark Cousins (1965) is a director, writer and film critic. He is known for his film The Story of Film: An Odyssey (2011), a 15-hour long documentary which was broadcast on television and also screened at the Toronto Film Festival; and Women Make Film: A New Road Movie Through Cinema (2018), a 14-hour long documentary about film history, focusing on the films made by women. He was a programmer at the Edinburgh Film Festival in 1996-97, hosted the Moviedrom and Scene by Scene TV shows at BBC2. In 2009, he and Tilda Swinton created a traveling film festival in Scotland. 

Jerry Rothwell is a filmmaker whose previous work includes the award-winning feature documentaries: How To Change The World, about the founders of Greenpeace; Sour Grapes (co-directed with Reuben Atlas) a film about a wine counterfeiter; School In The Cloud, about radical educationalist, Sugata Mitra; Town of Runners, about two girls in an Ethiopian village who aspire to be athletes; Donor Unknown, about a sperm donor and his many offspring; Heavy Load, about a group of people with learning disabilities who form a punk band, and Deep Water (co-directed with Louise Osmond), about Donald Crowhurst’s ill-fated voyage in the 1968 round the world yacht race. His work has won numerous accolades including two Grierson Awards, an Audience Award and Special Jury Prize at Sundance Film Festival, an RTS Award, the IDA Pare Lorentz Award and a BAFTA nomination.

Naziha Arebi is a Libyan/British artist and filmmaker who returned to Libya during the revolution. Naziha works at the intersection of art and activism, and is co-founder of the film collective HuNa. Alongside her first feature Freedom Fields, she is currently producing the documentary feature After a Revolution, and has a fiction film in development. Naziha is a Hot Docs-Blue Ice and Sundance Lab fellow, a WEF Global Shaper and part of the Lumiere d'Afrique collective. Her artwork has been published extensively in print and exhibited globally.

Carol Dysinger is known for her feature-length documentary, Camp Victory, Afghanistan, which premiered in competition at SXSW 2010, and played at the Museum of Modern Art Doc Fortnight and the Human Rights Watch Film Festival. Prior to directing, Dysinger edited many documentaries and features. As a screenwriter in Los Angeles, she co-wrote several scripts for Paramount, Twentieth Century Fox and Sam Goldwyn Productions. She was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship, and is currently developing a semi-autobiographical interactive piece depicting her experience with war.

Naziha Arebi is a Libyan/British artist and filmmaker who returned to Libya during the revolution. Naziha works at the intersection of art and activism, and is co-founder of the film collective HuNa. Alongside her first feature Freedom Fields, she is currently producing the documentary feature After a Revolution, and has a fiction film in development. Naziha is a Hot Docs-Blue Ice and Sundance Lab fellow, a WEF Global Shaper and part of the Lumiere d'Afrique collective. Her artwork has been published extensively in print and exhibited globally.

Deeyah Khan is an Emmy and Peabody award-winning documentary film director. In 2016, she became the first UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador for artistic freedom and creativity. Her documentary, Banaz: A Love Story (2012), chronicles the life and death of a young, British Kurdish woman murdered by her family in a so-called honor killing. Khan's second film, Jihad, involved two years of filming with Islamic extremists, convicted terrorists and former jihadis. Khan has also produced a number of critically-acclaimed albums, including Listen to the Banned, a compilation that brought together musicians from around the world who have been subject to persecution, censorship and imprisonment.

Deeyah Khan is an Emmy and Peabody award-winning documentary film director. In 2016, she became the first UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador for artistic freedom and creativity. Her documentary, Banaz: A Love Story (2012), chronicles the life and death of a young, British Kurdish woman murdered by her family in a so-called honor killing. Khan's second film, Jihad, involved two years of filming with Islamic extremists, convicted terrorists and former jihadis. Khan has also produced a number of critically-acclaimed albums, including Listen to the Banned, a compilation that brought together musicians from around the world who have been subject to persecution, censorship and imprisonment.

Peiman Zekavat is a London-based filmmaker and cinematographer. Both his fictional films and observational documentaries focus on social and humanitarian issues. In 2016, he filmed and directed a documentary series about the environmental destruction of the Amazon rainforest. In 2018, Canon UK commissioned him to shoot a documentary series about the world’s first female-led expedition in the Amazon.

Stephen Loveridge is a digital artist and filmmaker from London. MATANGI / MAYA / M.I.A. is his first documentary feature.