2020 Sundance Ignite x Adobe Fellows

Ten Emerging Artists Selected from Short Film Submissions on Sundance Co//ab

Winning Short Films To Be Screened As Part of Celebration of Sundance Film Festival: London

Los Angeles, CA - Sundance Institute and Adobe announced the class of 2020 Sundance Ignite x Adobe Fellows today, chosen from a global pool of more than 1,600 applicants. Hailing from a broad geography, from Nashville to Hong Kong, and rooted in a diverse array of creative disciplines from documentary filmmaking to narrative shorts, these 10 emerging artists selected will engage with a year of mentorship and support from Sundance Institute and Sundance Ignite founding partner Adobe.

Fellows were selected from a one-to-fifteen minute short film submitted to the Sundance Ignite x Adobe Short Film Challenge, hosted for the first time on Sundance Co//ab, the Institute's digital community platform. The ten Fellows were selected for their originality of voice, creativity in storytelling, and rigor of their craft.

The Fellowship is artist centric, with a goal of advancing each fellow to their next step in their filmmaking journey, both artistically and professionally. The Fellows will kick off their fellowship year with the Sundance Ignite Digital Filmmakers Lab, which began on Monday, July 13 on Sundance Co//ab and continues through the end of the week. The week-long lab will include sessions to prepare Fellows for the year ahead, from presenting your artistic self, pitching your project to case studies and goal setting.

Later this summer, nine of the Fellows' winning short films will be screened as part of Celebration of Sundance Film Festival: London, made available to all Festival passholders digitally on demand throughout the UK. Adobe is the Presenting Partner of Celebration of Sundance Film Festival: London, which runs August 7-9; more details are available at london.sundance.org.

In addition to receiving a complimentary year-long membership to Co//ab and a two-year Adobe Creative Cloud membership, each fellow will be paired with a Sundance Institute alumni mentor. This year's mentors are Andrew Ahn (Spa Night), Patricia Cordoso (Real Women Have Curves, Queen Sugar), Jeff Orlowski (Chasing Ice, Chasing Coral), Lacey Schwartz (Little White Lie), Hannah Pearl Utt (Before You Know It), Malik Vitthal (Imperial Dreams, Body Cam) and Roger Ross Williams (Life, Animated, The Innocence Files).

We're proud to support these ten emerging artists, who are creating bold new work that brings their stories, voice, and passion to life, said Meredith Lavitt, Director, Sundance Ignite. Sundance Ignite x Adobe Fellows aren't tomorrow's filmmakers, they're today's filmmakers - and we're thrilled to welcome them into the Sundance family.

At Adobe, our mission is to enable creativity for all. We believe that everyone has a story to tell and that those stories deserve to be heard. When we elevate a broader and more diverse set of voices we can create change within ourselves, our communities and the world, said John Travis, VP Brand Marketing, Adobe. We are so proud to partner with Sundance in the Sundance Ignite program and look forward to working with this year's fellows to help bring their stories, creativity, and perspectives to the world.

Sundance Ignite is supported by Adobe; Arison Arts Foundation; The Birth of a Nation Fellowship, founded by the creative and producing teams of the film; Southwest Airlines; East West Bank; and Jason Michael Berman.

The 2020 Sundance Ignite x Adobe Fellows are:

Jacob Anderson is a Kentucky-based writer, director, and cinematographer. He attended Western Kentucky University and graduated with a degree in Filmmaking. Post-graduation, Jacob has become a working cinematographer based in the Nashville, Tennessee area. He has begun writing and directing his own projects that will explore the boundaries of genre within the American South. Recently, Jacob has begun writing his first feature film and next short that will explore intimate stories about people against a backdrop of the American South. Once established, his goal is to bring film opportunities to other budding southern filmmakers in the future.

Sasha Argirov is a Canadian writer/director based in Vancouver. His short film, Personals, is soon to begin its festival tour. He is developing his debut feature about an anxious college student who lures his girlfriend as a vessel for his mothers ghost. He likes making films about lonely people in unusual situations.

Giselle Bonilla is a mediocre bartender desperately pursuing a back-up career as a filmmaker. She graduated with Honors from New York University's Tisch School of the Arts with a BFA in Film & Television Production. Her thesis film received the Horizon Award at the 2018 Sundance Film Festival and went on to compete in various festivals across the country. She is currently developing her first feature, and aims to shoot her proof of concept under the guidance of the Ignite Fellowship. Giselle is currently based in Los Angeles.

Aurora Brachman is a documentary filmmaker and MFA student in Documentary Film at Stanford University. She is also the recipient of a Fulbright Scholarship in Filmmaking to the pacific island nation of Kiribati where she directed the docuseries Between the Tides. She is currently working on a documentary about Club Quarantine, a virtual queer dance party where hundreds of people from around the world gather each night during the Covid-19 lockdowns. She primarily makes work about the experiences of various marginalized communities and is committed to collaborative and ethical storytelling.

Natalie A. Chao is a filmmaker and visual artist who completed her B.A degree in Film Production at USC in Los Angeles, with a focus in cinematography. Born, raised and currently based in Hong Kong, she is interes

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