George Eldred
Program Director, Aspen Film

Danielle Bernstein
Filmmaker & Producer, Clear Films

David Pomes
Writer & Director, Cook County

Adolfo B. Alix Jr.
Director, Adela

Maia Ermita
Festival and Outreach Director, Media That Matters / Arts Engine

Claudia Medina ("VJ Minerva")
EnMedia Productions

George Eldred is Program Director for Aspen Film, in Aspen, Colorado, USA. He manages the selection process for Aspen Film's festivals, film series and special presentations, including Aspen Filmfest, Summerfilms, Academy Screenings and Aspen Shortsfest, one of the most highly-regarded showcases for short cinema in North America. With over 30 years experience in the arts and in media, George has served as one of the shorts programmers for Sundance Film Festival, and has been a juror, professional panelist and guest curator at other international festivals including Cork, Toronto Worldwide and Palm Springs Shortfest. A University of Wisconsin-Madison graduate in Art, George worked for several years in film and video production and at the San Francisco International Film Festival before joining Aspen Film in 1996.

Danielle Bernstein is a New York based filmmaker from Atlanta, GA. She attended the School of the Museum of Fine Arts and graduated in 2006, the same year she co-founded the production company Clear Films and began working as Co-director/producer & cinematographer of the award-winning documentary When Clouds Clear. She is currently working as a freelance cinematographer in New York City and is producing another documentary, Mothers of a Nation as well as designing comprehensive outreach models for independent documentary projects.

http://www.clearfilms.org
http://www.mothersofanation.com

David Pomes was raised in Houston, Texas. He attended the University of Texas in Austin where he graduated with a BA in Government in 1991. He graduated from Texas Tech University, School of Law in 1996. After practicing law for ten years, David decided to make a movie. Writing his script late into the night after work, he quit practicing law when he completed the script. He then set forth to make his first film, "Cook County.”

Adolfo B. Alix Jr. was born in Makati City, Philippines. His films have screened at many international film festivals and have won a variety of awards, earning him recognition as one of the most promising and prolific young filipino filmmakers. His first film was the Philippines official submission to the 2007 Academy Awards Best Foreign Language Film Category. Adela, his feature starring veteran actress Anita Linda, was screened at Toronto, Pusan and Rotterdam International Film Festivals. It also won in all the categories of the Young Critics' Circle Awards 2009 including Best Picture and Best Performer.

Maia Ermita is the Festival and Outreach Director for the Media That Matters Film Festival - a year long outreach campaign combining community engagement and social activism with a new media approach and progressive educational techniques. Prior to joining Arts Engine, Maia served as the Educational Media Specialist for MHz Worldview - one of the few independent television networks in the Washington DC market. She has always been involved with media policy and new media production both in New York and Washington through groups such as NYCTV, Internet Education Foundation, Media Access Project and Thirteen/WNET. Maia graduated from the George Washington University with a degree in Electronic Media and a minor in Fine Arts & Art History.

Claudia Medina began her career as a filmmaker ten years ago working with acclaimed Canadian director Nettie Wild on her feature documentary "A Place Called Chiapas." Since then she has worked alongside a number of respected Canadian filmmakers as an editor, production coordinator, field producer and shooter. Most recently she worked alongside director Velcrow Ripper as he was shooting his latest award winning feature documentary, "Fierce Light". Claudia has been the recipient of numerous awards from the Canada Council of the Arts for her short dramatic films she has written and directed. For the past three years she has also been collaborating with artists of different disciplines to create visual projections for performances, and live vjing for electronic musicians throughout Canada and in Barcelona as "VJ Minerva." She also develops and implements curriculum for workshops that combine community development and conflict resolution through filmmaking to diverse groups nationally and internationally. Claudia is currently living in Barcelona, where she is completing a masters in Visual Culture as well as developing a feature documentary project about alternative economics called "Growing Growing Gone". She has just completed the production of her latest fiction film, "Animal Blessings" in the Friuli region of Italy and is set to complete post production by the new year.