Earth Week Sneak Peek, Spotlights, & More!
Upcoming events, a Climate Film Club recap, Diving with Rays, funding opportunities, and more!
Hi all,
Last month we kicked off our first Climate Film Club featuring Everything Wrong and Nowhere to Go (2022, dir. Sindha Agha), and this month we’re thrilled to announce our upcoming Earth Week mini-fest!
In this newsletter:
Upcoming CFF Events
Film Club Recap
Spotlight: Diving for Rays (2023, dir. Nova West)
10+ Funding Opportunities and Partner Events
April Events
We’re thrilled to announce the first of several programs during our Earth Week mini-festival! In partnership with Asia Society’s COAL + ICE exhibition, we’re showing KING COAL (2023, dir Elaine McMillion Sheldon) at their Park Avenue theater.
A lyrical tapestry of a place and people, KING COAL meditates on the complex history and future of the coal industry, the communities it has shaped, and the myths it has created. Oscar-nominated filmmaker Elaine McMillion Sheldon reshapes the boundaries of documentary filmmaking in a spectacularly beautiful and deeply moving immersion into Central Appalachia where coal is not just a resource, but a way of life, imagining the ways a community can re-envision itself.
Get your tickets here, and stay tuned for more upcoming events.
Climate Film Club: Everything Wrong and Nowhere to Go
It was great to see such a turnout on a Tuesday for our first film club at Five & Dime in the Woolworth Building! Everything Wrong and Nowhere to Go (2022, dir. Sindha Agha) is a candid and comedic self-portrait in which the filmmaker turns the camera on herself and goes in search of a cure for her crippling climate anxiety. We were honored to have Wendy Greenspun and Rebecca Weston, two luminaries of climate psychology, join us for a thoughtful and lively Q&A.
Wendy has generously shared some resources for climate anxiety that she developed in conjunction with the Climate Museum, including resources and recommendations for:
Where to read and learn more about climate and psychology.
How to build climate awareness, dialogue, and action in your workplace, union, school group, or faith institution.
Where to find groups or workshop for climate grief support or processing climate-related emotion.
Submit your film to our September Festival on FilmFreeway!
Our regular deadline closes May 3rd, with late submissions through June 3rd.
🌅 The Spotlight
The Spotlight series takes a fresh look at works of climate cinema
By Olivia Johnson
“I’m still, as far as I know, potentially the only trans underwater cinematographer out there. I would love to meet another person like me. But I’ve grown really comfortable with knowing that I very well could be the unicorn for now.”
Exploring the Depths of Representation: A Dive into Nova West's Filmmaking Journey
In an industry dominated by traditional norms, Nova West is a beacon of creativity and inclusion. As a National Geographic Explorer, Video Engineer for the EV Nautilus, and wildlife filmmaker specializing in expedition and underwater cinematography, Nova’s journey is as fascinating as the depths they explore. They’re also my friend, courtesy of the Jackson Wild Media Lab, and I’m thrilled to have an excuse to pepper them with questions about their impressive career.
Today we’re chatting about their documentary, Diving for Rays (2023), a short film that serves as a visually stunning testament to the power of representation in STEM fields, particularly for the Queer community. The film follows Nova’s friend, Nicole Morris, along her journey from aspiring marine conservationist to realizing her dreams despite feeling marginalized as a Queer woman in the field.
Raised in San Diego among sea creatures, particularly drawn to rays, Nicole found solace and identity in the ocean. The documentary captures her decision to pursue her passion, highlighting the lack of LGBTQ+ visibility in marine science and its impact on aspiring conservationists.
As the conversation unfolds, Nova offers insights into the intersection of nature and queerness, highlighting the ocean as a metaphor for diversity and fluidity. “The ocean, to me, is one of the queerest things I can think of in nature because it’s full of so much life that doesn’t fit into a box in any way, shape, or form. And water itself does not fit into a box in any way, shape, or form.” I quietly muse on my own opinions on how impactful it is to combine hard science with squishy, intangible “feelings type things,” and Nova smiles, thoughtfully adding: “Hard science is often built to be so inaccessible because it takes a lot of information to comprehend it and to process it. So combining nature, which is something that's a part of all of us and is just back of the mind instinct, I think is a really great gateway into helping people understand bigger concepts.”
This resonates with me, as it is a big part of why I joined CFF. People respond best to messages that feel personal and immediate in their own lives, and film is undoubtedly one of the most powerful mediums for conveying such messages. Now more than ever, we need climate messages to hit home. Nova agrees, expanding on my point to include other forms of art, beautifully putting it: “If music is a way that your community really shines together and communicates together and bonds over, bring that music into your conservation work. Write a song about conservation or putting it in your documentary, take non-traditional documentary filmmaking aspects and work that into your films.”
Diving for Rays is currently streaming on WaterBear. You can keep up with Nova’s adventures via their website, and read the full interview on CFF’s blog.
Olivia is an award winning director and producer with a passion for climate media. She holds degrees in Environmental Studies and English, and has worked on projects for Comedy Central, Fox, NBC, and Netflix. Her independent short documentary, Caddisfly, is available to stream on WaterBear. She currently works at the intersection of machine learning and sustainability for Climate Change AI, and is one of CFF's Programming Leads and Founding Volunteers.
Opportunities & Events
🐅 New York WILD Film Festival (Apr. 3 - 7)
New York WILD™ is the first annual documentary film festival in New York to showcase a spectrum of topics, from exploration and adventure to wildlife, conservation and the environment, bringing all things WILD to one of the most urban cities in the world.
💸 Creative Capital Open Call (Due Apr. 4)
For our 25th Anniversary, Creative Capital welcomes innovative and original new project proposals in visual arts, performing arts, film/moving image, technology, literature, multidisciplinary, and socially engaged forms. The Creative Capital Award provides unrestricted project grants which can be drawn down over a multi-year period, bespoke professional development services, and community-building opportunities. Film/moving image grants include: experimental film, short film, animation, documentary film, narrative film, and socially engaged and/or sustainable film/moving image-based practices.
🌎 National Geographic’s Grants & Investments, Levels I & II (Due Apr. 11)
The recipients of these grants, who we call National Geographic Explorers, are a diverse community of changemakers from around the world working to support our mission to illuminate and protect the wonder of our world.
🟡 Shut the Fossils Up (STFU) / Yellow Dot Studios’ Dirty Disinfo Smackdown (Due Apr. 12)
We’re looking for material that is original, funny or creative, and can be helpful to mobilizing people to take action against disinformation, with $25,000 in prizes to combat disinformation spread by the fossil fuel industry.
🎬 Where Nature Meets City: Three Short Films and Discussions (Apr. 22)
Celebrate Earth Day by joining The New School’s Urban Systems Lab in-person for an eye-opening event about the crucial role of nature in crafting cities that overcome climate change. This evening will feature three short films, after which members of the Urban Systems Lab will share insights on how integrating nature into cities can help make them more resilient.
📽️ Bloomberg Green Docs Open Call (Due Apr. 26)
The Bloomberg Green Docs competition is open to all eligible filmmakers who would like to compete to win a $25,000 grand prize for a short climate documentary. We want to explore our climate future with documentaries that reveal the world we are making today. Ecosystems are being restored and tomorrow’s zero-carbon communities are being formed. At the same time, extremes in our habitats warn of cascading climate consequences.
🌊 Art at the Edge Climate Exhibition RFP (Due Apr. 26)
The Waterfront Alliance seeks original proposals from individual artists, collaborative artist teams, arts and culture-related businesses, graduate-level art and design students, and other for-profit or nonprofit organizations or entities that will provide a public art project (sculpture, installation, performance, or other artistic medium) that will activate spaces through a climate, water, or environmental justice lens. The project will feature three to five artists and award each up to $7,500.
Upcoming Opportunities
🎨 Arts & Climate Incubator (Due May 5)
🐺 2024 Jackson Wild Media Awards (Due May 15)
✍️ Grist’s Imagine 2200: Write the Future (Due June 24)
🪨❄️ Coal + Ice @ Asia Society (Rolling)