Shine Global’s Executive Director and Co-Founder Susan MacLaury will be honored at the Women in Media-Newark’s sixth annual International Film Festival in celebration of Women’s History Month. Several other accomplished women also will be celebrated during the Festival. Those honored are: Dr. Diane Hill, Assistant Chancellor at Rutgers University-Newark; Gwen Moten, Executive Director, The Mayor’s Office of Arts, Cultural Development and Tourism for Newark; Ousseina Alidou, Ph.D., internationally renowned author, public speaker and former director, Center for African Studies, Rutgers; Donna Walker-Kuhne, Vice President , Community Engagement, New Jersey Performing Arts Center; and New Jersey Assistant Attorney General Tracey Thompson, Esq., who specializes in human trafficking.
This year, the festival theme is And Still I Rise, dedicated to the vision of the late arts activists Ruby Dee and Maya Angelou, and the focus will be on “disappeared” women. The festival opens with a screening of the 1971 classic film Janie’s Janie. Other highlights include a screening of Cuban director Gloria Rolando’s film Reembarque/Reshipment with Emmy Award winning artist Wyclef Jean and his wife Claudinette participating in the discussion following the screening; a jazz concert featuring pianist Geri Allen’s Trio and the Mimi Jones Fantastic Four with special guest Tia Fuller; a screening of The Art of Ama Ata Aidoo, which chronicles the life of the famed Ghanian writer; a panel discussion on human featuring NJ Asst. Attorney General Tracey Thompson, Essex County Asst. Prosecutor Kelly Sandler, FBI Victim Specialist Keyla Munoz, and Zonta International’s United Nations representative specializing in human trafficking Pat Latona; a screening of the Israeli film Where is Elle-Kari and What Happened to Noriko-san? director, Dvorit Sharkal to be in attendance; and screenings of Mercedes Gaspar’s Escapes/Huidas (Spain) and Sophia Turkiewicz’s Once My Mother (Poland/Australia), in conjunction with the inaugural exhibition of the Dana Library’s Holocaust Digital Print Collection by the late Carol Rosen, and hosting by the Newark Women’s Conference on March 26th.
Other Festival activities will include interviews with filmmakers, panel discussions, vendors and a Silent Auction. In addition, Fertile Soil, an art exhibit curated by Gladys Barker Grauer that features the works of four local women artists at Paul Robeson Student Center at Rutgers University-Newark has been scheduled to coincide with the eight-day Film Festival.
Women In Media – Newark is an organization that advocates for and educates the public about issues affecting the lives of women using film, video, and new media as their platform. Merging culture and academia, they rally behind women who courageously struggle to assume leadership roles in the film industry with their conscious effort to present a balanced image of women, dispelling the stereotypes and changing public perception of their sisters worldwide. The film festival runs from March 24 – April 1 and is free and open to the public. More information can be found at www.WIM-N.com