Advisory Committee

Meet the industry experts, practitioners, and thought leaders helping AIDC develop a conference that addresses international trends and opportunities.

2024 Advisory Committee

Marissa McDowell
Producer, Black and White Films (AUS)

Marissa McDowell is a Wiradjuri woman, born in Cowra, NSW, Australia. She has over 15 years’ experience working in the First Nations multi-media storytelling space, and is passionate about working with the film industry to share creatively ambitious and diverse First Nations stories that have global appeal. Throughout her career, she has worked with First Nations communities to share stories with a wider audience across commissioning, producing, photography and writing. At National Indigenous Television (NITV), she has overseen the commissioning of original First Nations content, including feature documentaries Skin in the Game, Keeping Hope and the award-winning Rebel with a Cause collection, as well as documentary series Our Law and First Inventors, and children’s series Eddies Lil’ Homies. As a producer, she has also had documentaries screened on SBS/NITV. She has had poetry published through USMOB Writing, and photographs displayed at PhotoAccess and the Sydney Living Museum.

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Dena Curtis
Producer, Writer & Director, Inkey Media (AUS)

First Nations filmmaker, Dena Curtis is a producer, writer and director. Throughout her career, Dena has worked at National Indigenous Television as a Senior Editor and Promo Producer, and the Australian Broadcasting Corporation as the Series Producer of Message Stick then later a Commissioning Editor for Indigenous, overseeing development and production on The Darkside, Yagan, 88, Buckskin, The Redfern Story, Outside Chance and Wild Kitchen. Her directing credits include award-winning short films Hush, Jacob and Nan and a Whole Lot of Trouble. Comedy series, 8MMM Aboriginal Radio, documentary series, Shadow Trackers, Colour Theory Underground, children’s series, Thalu and two episodes of ABC’s factual series Back to Nature. Most recently Dena directed a chapter of the anthology feature We Are Still Here and feature length documentary A League of Her Own. Her producing credits include Logie-nominated children’s television series, Grace Beside Me, short films Walters Ghost and Shed and documentaries Ella, Shadow Trackers and Belonging. Dena co-produced Firebite for See-Saw Films/AMC Network and was Producer on ABC’s First Weapons, and Executive Producer for Rebel with a Cause – a 4x1hr documentary series for NITV.

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Opal H. Bennett
Senior Producer, POV / Executive Producer, POV Shorts, American Documentary, Inc. (USA)

Opal H. Bennett is an Emmy-winning senior producer at POV and executive producer at POV Shorts. Under her leadership, POV Shorts broadcast the 2021 NewsDoc Emmy Winner for Short Documentary, The Love Bugs. Previously, Opal was Shorts Programmer and Director of Artist Development at DOCNYC and Senior Programmer at Athena Film Festival. She has also worked with Nantucket Film Festival, Aspen ShortsFest and Tribeca Film Festival. Opal is a member of the AMPAS Documentary branch and is a board member of the Manhattan Theatre Club (MTC). She has participated on various festival juries and selection committees for film grants.  A Columbia Law grad, Opal holds a Masters from the LSE and received her B.A. from NYU.

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Nainita Desai
Composer, Soundology (UK)

Nainita Desai is a multi-award-winning composer and sound designer for television, film and videogames who has scored acclaimed non-fiction titles including the Oscar-nominated and Cannes-winning For Sama, the Sundance Audience Award-winning The Reason I Jump and the Emmy-nominated Body Parts. Most recently, Desai scored The Deepest Breath (A24, Netflix), which earned her a Critics Choice Documentary Awards nomination. Her score for 2022’s 14 Peaks: Nothing is Impossible received a Primetime Emmy nomination for Outstanding Music Composition. She is an RTS winner, a double BIFA nominee, a Cinema Eye Honors nominee, and the 2022 winner of The Gravity Media Creative Technology Award at the Women in Film and Television Awards, UK. Upcoming 2024 projects include the landmark natural history series Earthsounds for Apple TV,  an upcoming James Cameron series for the BBC and Nat Geo, as well as premium feature docs for Netflix, and Universal.

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Violet Du Feng
Filmmaker, Fish + Bear Pictures (USA/CHN)

Violet is an Emmy-winning independent documentarian and an adjunct professor at the Journalism School of Columbia University. Violet directed and produced the Oscar-shortlisted documentary Hidden Letters which premiered in competition at the 2022 Tribeca Film Festival before screening in 10 international festivals and was broadcast in more than 15 countries. She directed the PBS/CPB special Harbor from the Holocaust with music performed by Yo-Yo Ma. She has directed, produced and executive produced 13 documentaries. Her producing credits include Dear Mother, I Meant to Write About Death (2022), Singing in the Wilderness (2021), Confucian Dream (2019), Maineland (2017), and Please Remember Me (2015). Violet started her career as a co-producer on the critically acclaimed 2007 Sundance Special Jury winner, Peabody and Emmy winner Nanking. Born in Shanghai, and based in New York, Violet holds a bachelor’s degree in journalism from Fudan University and received her MFA in journalism from University of California at Berkeley.

 

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Keisha Knight
Director of IDA Funds and Advocacy, International Documentary Association (IDA) (USA)

Keisha Knight is the director of IDA Funds. In this capacity, Keisha oversees a portfolio of IDA’s granting and artist support programs, including the IDA Enterprise Production Fund, Logan Elevate Grant, Nonfiction Access Initiative, and the Pare Lorentz Documentary Fund, among other granting programs. Keisha has served on numerous juries and review panels and is a  2022-2023 Warhol Curatorial Research Fellow. She is also the founder and Executive Director of Sentient.Art.Film and a doctoral candidate in Art, Film, and Visual Studies at Harvard University.

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Brigid O'Shea
Co-Director, DAE – Documentary Association of Europe (GER)

Brigid O’Shea is a documentary consultant, helping projects and filmmakers reach their full international potential and professional goals. Her network spans the globe, working on all continents with both emerging talent and industry veterans. She’s worked on festival strategy with ARTE on projects like Generation Africa and Generation Ukraine. She serves on the boards of B2B Doc, Circle Women Doc Accelerator, and Dokufest in Prizren, Kosovo. She is an intersectional queer feminist. She founded the Documentary Association of Europe, a member network and support system for documentary filmmakers that has grown to 700 members in just three years. She currently serves as the co-director of this organization. She was head of DOK Industry Programme at DOK Leipzig and worked for the Berlin International Film Festival for more than 10 years. She is an internationally-respected curator, and tutors across the globe on festival strategy, international co-financing and pitching as well as cultural management.

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Jean-Jacques Peretti
Programming, Sunny Side of the Doc (FRA)

Jean-Jacques Peretti is in charge of the editorial line at Sunny Side of the Doc, the internationally renowned market place for documentary and factual content. Working with the rest of the team on the organization of the schedule of events, panels, case studies, pitch sessions with the main international players, Jean-Jacques also works as an expert with many international festivals and markets. Born in France, Jean-Jacques studied films and literature in France and the US. He has worked many years in documentary production for companies such as Les Films d’Ici, 2nd Vague Productions, etc, before joining Sunny Side of the Doc in 2002.

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Tracey Corbin-Matchett
CEO, Bus Stop Films (AUS)

Tracey is a proud hard of hearing woman with a passion for film, advocacy and inclusion. As CEO of Bus Stop Films she is advocating for greater representation of people with disability in the screen industry, receiving an OAM in 2023 for service to the arts and to people with disability. Her 25-year career has crossed social housing, women’s domestic violence services, and the film and television industry. Her advocacy work in the screen industry has seen her lead on strategies including Screenability and She Shoots at Screen NSW, WIFT’s Raising Films Australia, and growing the work of Bus Stop Films on a global scale. Tracey is Executive Producer of Bus Stop’s slate and co-produced films including Groundhog Night and Valiant. Tracey holds a Bachelor of Arts, Welfare Studies (WSU) and a Diploma of Business, Frontline Management (UTS).

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Alexandra Gilbert
Head of Content, Prime Video Australia and New Zealand (AUS)

As Head of Content, Ally leads local content efforts and is responsible for the design and execution of Prime Video’s local content slate, including TV and film licensing, for the Prime Video service in Australia and New Zealand. Ally joined Amazon in September 2016 as legal counsel supporting Prime Video in the US before moving on to other roles covering international expansion of the Prime Video Channels business, including leading the content acquisition function for the launch of Prime Video Channels in Australia. Prior to Amazon, Ally spent 7 years as a lawyer with Bauer Media (now Are Media) and in private practice. She holds a Bachelor of Laws (Hons) from Monash, and currently resides in Melbourne, Australia.

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Michael Hilliard
Executive Producer, Boardwalk Pictures Australia (AUS)

As Executive Producer at Boardwalk Pictures Australia, in addition to overseeing all Australian projects, Hilliard consults and produces on Boardwalk’s global slate of studio content, originals, line production, and brand storytelling.  Focused on authenticity and collaboration, Boardwalk partners with a diverse community of storytellers, creating mainstream entertainment across a variety of genres, including Welcome to Wrexam, Pepsi’s The Show, The Goop Lab, Val, Last Chance U, and Cheer. Best known for the documentary series Chef’s Table and Robert Redford’s Iconoclasts, Michael’s career began on-tour with The Rolling Stones in 1997, capturing live concerts.  Since then, his work with award-winning actors, musicians, artists, and sports figures often features a bit of rock and roll, a human truth, and something unexpected.  Michael is a member of the International and US Television Academy, the Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts, and Screen Producers Australia. 

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Lexi Landsman
Head of Development, Fremantle Australia (AUS)

Lexi is an author and unscripted producer, who has worked in development, production and post across a range of award-winning factual and reality shows for over 15 years. Lexi is currently Head of Development at Fremantle Australia and has previously held senior roles at ITV Studios and the Seven Network. She co-created the crime series Con Girl; her other development credits include Tony Armstrong’s Extra-Ordinary Things, Sydney Airport, Towies, and Australian versions of Alone and My Mum, Your Dad.  Her recent production credits include Nurses, Emergency Call, Border Security, Australia’s Deadliest, Bachelor and Back in Time For DinnerAs an author, she has written two novels, published by Penguin Random House. Her second novel is in development for an adaptation into a psychological drama series. She has a Masters degree in Media Practice from the University of Sydney and a bachelor degree in Media Arts and Production from UNSW.

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Oscar Raby
CO-FOUNDER & CREATIVE DIRECTOR, VRTOV (AUS)

Oscar Raby is a multimedia artist, co-founder and creative director at VRTOV, the Melbourne-based virtual reality studio behind the projects A Machine for Viewing, The Turning Forest, Easter Rising: Voice of a Rebel and Assent. VRTOV has been commissioned by the US, UK, and Australia. In 2013 he completed a Masters degree in animation and interactive media at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology where the subject of his research was portraiture in new media. His graduating work, the autobiographical virtual reality documentary Assent, has been part of Sundance New Frontier, IDFA DocLab and Sheffield DocFest as well as festivals in Australia, Canada, USA, Mexico, the Netherlands and the UK. Assent received the Audience Award for Cross-platform at Sheffield DocFest 2014. Oscar is currently working on a PhD at SensiLab, Monash University, that examines the underlying technical and poetic affordances of XR authoring software.

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