THE FILMMAKERS

ALDONA WATTS
DIRECTOR & producer

Aldona Watts is an award-winning filmmaker working in the Bay Area and New York. Land of Songs is her first film. She is currently developing new projects and working as a documentary editor and producer. Since 2011, she has been an organizer at Her Girl Friday, an intersectional feminist collective dedicated to supporting journalists and nonfiction storytellers. www.aldonawatts.com

julian WATTS
PRODUCER & DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY

Julian Watts (Aldona’s brother) is an artist whose work spans sculpture, design, music composition, and film. His sculptural wood carvings are shown through BDDW, Patrick Parrish, and The Cold Press have been featured in the London Design Fair, Design Miami, and Salone del Mobile Milan. www.julianwattsstudio.com 

NICHOLAS BERGER
EDITOR

Nicholas Berger is a documentary filmmaker whose films have aired on PBS, been nominated for two Student Academy Awards, and have been shown in film festivals around the world including IDFA, Edinburgh International Film Festival, Silverdocs, Palm Springs Shorts Fest, and Ann Arbor Film Festival. Nicholas has worked on all aspects of filmmaking from producing and directing to shooting and editing and has worked on films for the History Channel, Discovery, CNN and PBS. He is also the co-author of two children's books on filmmaking for Klutz Press. Nicholas holds a bachelor’s degree in philosophy from Brown University and an MFA in Documentary Film and Video from Stanford University. www.pineconepictures.com 

JAMES KENNARD
CINEMATOGRAPHER

James Kennard is a British-American filmmaker raised in the San Francisco Bay Area, now working in Los Angeles. The last 10 years of his career has mainly been in feature documentaries, interspersed with commercial work. www.jameskennard.com

AVA BENJAMIN SHORR
ASSOCIATE PRODUCER

Ava Benjamin Shorr is a Director of Photography who also happens to be a transgender woman. She was raised by a Mormon mother and a Jewish father in Portland, Oregon. Her early passion for cinematography was stoked by skateboarding videos and art-house cinema.

Technical prowess, photographic experimentation, and identity are all a fixture of her work. The feature documentary, Disclosure (executive produced by Laverne Cox), premiered at Sundance 2020 and was released by Netflix. Gossamer Folds, a narrative feature starring Jackson Robert Scott, Shane West, and Alexandra Grey, is slated for a 2020 release as well. 

Ava was included on a list of “Mind Blowing Women Cinematographers” by Emmy Rossum, awarded an ASC Vision Mentorship with Rachel Morrison, ASC (Black Panther, Mudbound), and has even had a documentary made about her that premiered on Nowness and is currently making its way through the 2020 festival circuit. www.avabenjamin.com