Juries and prizes 2022

For 30 years, Rithy Panh has been creating a powerful fresco devoted to the Cambodian genocide, each stage of which is a rediscovery of art and memory. 

After confronting the mechanisms of evil (S-21: the Khmer Rouge Killing Machine, 2003) and the figure of the executioner (Duch, Master of the Forges of Hell, 2011), he has been exploring the themes of memory and oblivion since 2013's The Missing Picture, which earned him an award at Cannes and an Oscar nomination, as well as in Exile (2016). In Graves without a Name (2018), he turned his camera on himself for the first time. Rithy Panh is also the co-founder of the Bophana Centre, a training centre and place of memory for cinema in Phnom Penh. His films have regularly been selected and awarded at the FIFDH, of which he is a patron.

A deeply political artist, Monika Borgmann studied Arabic philology and political science in Bonn and Damascus before becoming a freelance journalist for German radio and print media. In 2005, together with the Lebanese filmmaker, political scientist and activist Lokman Slim, she created the Umam Documentation and Research, which gathers archives and testimonies to preserve the memory of the civil violence and wars that have shaken Lebanon. The same year, they co-directed the feature documentary Massaker, selected and awarded worldwide, followed by Tadmor in 2016, which also proved a great success. In 2008 she published the book Saïd Mekbel, une mort à la lettre. Since the assassination of Lokman Slim in Natabatieh in February 2021, she fights for the investigation to be carried out and to preserve his memory.

A notable highlight of the latest Rencontres de la Photographie d'Arles was the exhibition THAWRA! REVOLUTION! dedicated to young Sudanese photography and the overthrow of Omar al-Bashir. Among the works presented, Kandakas (Queens) can’t be stopped by Eythar Gubara, 33, was unanimously awarded the prestigious Prix Madame Figaro. These "queens" are women in chiaroscuro, free, powerful and on their feet despite their chains, accompanied by texts of great emotional strength. Eythar Gubara is undoubtedly powerful: since 2014, she has been building and supporting, through her photographs and her daily involvement, the struggle of human rights activists, women and LBGTIQ* people, in a country where homosexuality was punishable by death until 2019.

Eythar Gubara will participate in a public conversation.

Callum Macrae has been making documentaries for 20 years in the UK, Iraq, Sri Lanka, Japan, Haiti, and several African countries, covering conflicts in the Ivory Coast, Uganda, Mali and Sudan. His reports, mainly for television networks, are broadcast worldwide. His awards include the Scottish BAFTA 'Special Achievement' award. In 2013, Macrae presented the world premiere of No Fire Zone: the Killing Fields of Sri Lanka at the FIFDH and the UN Human Rights Council, a hard-hitting documentary exposing the massacre of civilians by the Sri Lankan government in 2009. Together with an impact campaign, the film successfully shifted the international agenda.

Callum Macrae will give a public Masterclass at Impact Days.

At 29, renowned Burmese artist and activist Chuu Wai Nyein was just opening an art studio in Yangon when the military coup took place on 1 February 2021. In response, she took to the streets and launched the Write for Right art movement, encouraging protesters to write or draw on large colourful signs. One word keeps echoing through the streets: Democracy. Tireless, Chuu Wai Nyein became involved with feminist movements and sold her work to support the Civil Disobedience Movement. In April 2021, threats forced her into exile in France, where she resumed creating performances, exhibiting her incendiary canvases and, of course, her commitment: "I will always continue to protest, wherever I am", she proudly declares in a portrait for TIME Magazine.

She will participate in a public conversation.

Born in 1990, Shahrbanoo Sadat grew up in a modest family. Determined to study, she was admitted to a boys' school located a six-hour walk from her home. At 18, she enrolled at the Kabul University's film faculty before setting up her production company in 2013. Her first two features were met with acclaim: Wolf and Sheep (2016) tells the story of a young girl's dreams of emancipation, while The Orphanage (2019) tells the story of a street kid and his Bollywood dreams. Until now, the filmmaker had not wanted to tell the story of her country through the prism of war. But on 15 August 2021, as the Taliban entered Kabul, she declared: "If I survive, I want to make a film about what my country is going through. My cinema will have changed forever”. After nine days of anguish, she was evacuated to France with her family. She is invited to the FIFDH in partnership with the International Coalition for Filmmakers at Risk (ICFR).

Director of I am Truly a Drop of Sun on Earth in 2017, which had its world premiere in Rotterdam and won an award in Belfort, Elene Naveriani is committed to taking us off the beaten track by putting 'the margin' at the centre. Possessing a very singular power, their cinema is constantly in motion, creating and revisiting both new and familiar forms. Born in 1985 in Tbilisi, Georgia, Elene initially studied painting at the Tbilisi State Academy of Arts before graduating twice from HEAD-Geneva in 2014. Their feature film Wet Sand was selected at the last Locarno Film Festival and will be released in French cinemas in spring 2022.

Julien Neutres is a graduate of the French School of National Administration (ENA) and holds both a doctorate in history and a degree in economics. He is the director of creation, territories and audiences at the French National Film Centre (CNC), where he has notably worked on the creation of CNC Talents, the first fund dedicated to financing artistic works for the free and open web, on Youtube, Snapchat, Instagram or Tik Tok. At the same time, together with the artist JR, he has recently founded the entirely free-of-charge Collège citoyen de France, to train the "France of the future": citizens who carry out civic and positive projects throughout the country. Passionate about Italian cinema and the cinematic writing of history, Julien Neutres is also the author of several books, including Et Fellini fonda Rome, published by Cherche-Midi.

After a professional career as founder and editor-in-chief of several media outlets and host of programs on Léman Bleu Television, Radio-Lac and Yes FM, Thierry Oppikofer is the founder and managing director of the Journal de l'Immobilier, the real estate supplement of the daily newspaper Le Temps. Member of the Board of the Hélène and Victor Barbour Foundation since 2019, he represents it in the various cultural activities it deploys. He has a long-standing interest in cinema, and his participation in the Jury of the Barbour Prize for the 2022 edition of the FIFDH is a continuation of his work.