Terry George is a native of Belfast, Northern Ireland. His first dramatic work, the prison escape play, The Tunnel, was staged at the Irish Arts Center in New York in 1986. The Tunnel was the first of numerous collaborations with writer/director Jim Sheridan. In 1992, George and Sheridan wrote In the Name of the Father. The film was nominated for seven Academy Awards including George’s nomination for best screenplay. In 1996, George was named Young European Film Director of the Year for his directorial debut Some Mother’s Son starring Helen Mirren. Since then, he has written or directed numerous feature films including, The Boxer starring Daniel Day Lewis, A Bright Shining Lie, Hart’s War, Reservation Road starring Joaquin Phoenix, and The Promise starring Oscar Issac and Christian Bale.  In 2004, he wrote, directed and produced Hotel Rwanda starring Don Cheadle. The film was nominated for three Academy Awards including Best Screenplay. In television his work has included creating and executive producing the CBS TV series The District, and directing HBO’s Luck starring Dustin Hoffmann. In 2012, his short film The Shore, produced by his daughter Oorlagh George, won the Academy Award for the Best Live Action Short Film.

Orwa Nyrabia is the Artistic Director of the International Documentary FF Amsterdam (IDFA), the world’s leading documentary film and new media dedicated festival. Before IDFA, Orwa co-founded Syria’s first independent FF, DOX BOX, together with Diana El Jeiroudi, and was a producer with credits that include Republic of Silence (Diana El Jeiroudi, Venice 2021), Notturno (Gianfranco Rosi, Venice 2020), Silvered Water (Ossama Mohammad and W. Bedirxan, Cannes 2014), Return to Homs (Talal Derki, IDFA 2013) and Dolls, A Woman from Damascus (Diana El Jeiroudi, IDFA 2007) a. o. His work was recognized by awards such as the George Polk Award, the HRW Courage in Filmmaking Award, and the Katrin Cartlidge Award, a. o. An actor by training (Gate of the Sun, Yousri Nasrallah, Cannes 2004), he started his film career as 1st assistant of Ossama Mohammad (Sacrifices, Cannes 2002) and worked as a journalist at the same time until he co-founded his first company in Damascus 2002, then followed up as he moved to Cairo and then to Berlin where he co-founded No Nation Films in 2014.

Florian Hoffmann was born in Berlin in 1987. After graduating from high school, he worked in foreign aid in West Africa. In 2008, he began his studies in ethnology, sociology and political science at University of Basel, Switzerland. Upon graduating magna cum laude with a bachelor's degree, Hoffman took up his directorial studies at the German Film and Television Academy Berlin (dffb). As of 2015, he has directed multiple award winning feature and documentary films. From 2016 on, he regularly taught for the Goethe-Institut Abidjan, the Heinrich Böll Foundation, as well as for the Television Workshop on Development Policy. Between 2019 - 21 Florian functioned as a technical assistant for Carolin Emcke's and  Manuela Bojadžijev's video installation Archive of Refuge (HKW, Berlin). Since 2021, he has been assisting directors such as Kornél Mundruczó, René Pollesch and Julien Gosselin at the Berlin Theatre Volksbühne. Florian was a jury member at the Dokfilmfestival München (2016), a juror of the Berlinale "Friedenspreis" (2018) and was selected as a "Berlinale Talent" in 2022. 

Luc Hardyis a French-American technology entrepreneur and investor, explorer and environmental advocate, photographer and film producer. He is the founder and head of Sagax Development Corp, a consulting and investment firm and Sagax Entertainment, a film production company. He is a member of the Explorers Club of New York, of the Société des Explorateurs Français and a Fellow of the Royal Geographic Society. Through his NGO Pax Arctica, Hardy has led and sponsored numerous scientific expeditions and projects, traveling to remote corners of the world to raise awareness about global causes related to climate change, biodiversity and human justice. Luc Hardy is a published art photographer and the author of several books including: Antarctic Adventure, Greenland Impressions, Arctic Transitions and The Pursuit of Endurance - On the Shoulders of Shackleton. He is involved in the production of projects and films on environmental and human justice issues. Through his media company Sagax Entertainment, Hardy has produced or co-produced several documentaries and feature films, mostly on themes at the intersection of environment and social justice causes. Some titles include: Arktika Incognita (Gold Award, Spotlight Documentary FF), The Pursuit of Endurance and At the Edge of Light as producer and expedition leader, as well as Eami (Tiger Award, Rotterdam FF), All That Divides Us (Dir.: Thierry Klifa with Catherine Deneuve and Diane Kruger), The Last Worlds (Dir.: Jonathan Nossiter with Nick Nolte and Charlotte Rampling), The Extraordinary Journey of the Fakir (Dir.: Ken Scott, with Dhanush, Bérénice Bejo, and Gérard Jugnot) as co-producer. He was also the first co-producer of the Award-winning PBS American Masters animated documentary film Unladylike: The Changemakers (Dir.: Charlotte Mangin).

2019 Laureate of Aurora Prize for Awakening Humanity, Yezidi Human Rights and Social Activist; Founder of the German based NGO Air Bridge Iraq (2007) and Yezidi Relief Fund (2005) to support vulnerable women, children and terror victims; Former Advisor to the Iraqi President for the Affairs of Non-Muslim Minorities and recently KRG Advisor for the Disputed Areas; Expert on Iraqi Minority affairs; Founder of House of Coexistence in Sinjar (2021), a post-genocide holistic center to promote peace, stability, rebuilding and reconciliation in Iraq. 2016 Laureate of the Golden Stauffer-Medaille, highest Award for extraordinary engagements, granted by the Prime Minister of State Baden-Württemberg. 2021 Recipient of Special Mention of the Human Rights Prize of French Republic

Director, scriptwriter, producer, teacher. Born in Kazan. Graduated from the Kazan University as a philologist. Was a teacher at a village school, later a reporter in republican newspapers. In 1989 Marina Razbezhkina started writing and shooting documentaries. She wrote and directed more than 35 documentary films which participated in competition at the festivals IDFA, DOK Leipzig, ARTDOCFEST and many others.
In 2004 Razbezhkina made her first feature film “Harvest Time” which was awarded numerous prizes at international festivals in Europe, the USA, China, and South Korea. The film was shortlisted for the Fassbinder nomination - Discovery of the Year (2004) by the European Film Academy, won the Golden Disc at the Chicago Film Festival, the FIPRESCI Prize at the Moscow International Film Festival, the Silver Alexander Prize, and the Prize for Artistic Achievement at Thessaloniki Film Festival. One of the wordings in the award sheet of the film "Harvesting Time" was: "For the artistic disclosure of the pagan nature of the totalitarian myth."
Four times she became the winner of the national film award "Laurel Branch", including "For Contribution to Film Chronicle". Chairman and jury member of international film festivals in Germany, Italy, Georgia, Armenia, Russia, permanent tutor in the Doctrain program of the German Goethe Institute, artistic director of the international festival of documentary debuts in Sviyazhsk (Republic of Tatarstan), annually gives master classes in documentary film directing in Russia , USA, China, England, Switzerland, France, Czech Republic, Poland, Georgia, Armenia, etc.
For the past 14 years Marina Razbezhkina has headed the School of Documentary Film and Documentary Theatre, which she founded together with Mikhail Ugarov. This is the first author's Film School in Russia. This is a unique educational project which arouses a lot of interest in film school in Europe and the USA. Films by the School graduates invariably participate in Russian and international festivals.
Marina Razbezhkina is a member of several film academies: the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences "Oscar", the European Film Academy, the Russian Film Academy NIKA.
Lives in Moscow.

After studying German language and literature for two years at Tbilisi State University, Gaga Chkheidze graduated from the Faculty of Literature and Arts of Friedrich Schiller University Jena, Germany.
In the 1980s he worked as producer at the State Broadcasting Company of Georgia and as educator, teaching German Literature at Ilia State University and Tbilisi State University.
In the 1990s he worked as program coordinator and also translator at the Forum of New Cinema (Berlin International Film Festival) and Arsenal Cinema (Berlin).
Gaga Chkheidze is the founder and director of the Cinema Art Center Prometheus and Tbilisi International Film Festival (since 2001). During 2005-2021 he was a Board Member of the Georgian Film Fund.
Gaga Chkheidze was appointed twice as the director of the Georgian National Film Center: in 2005 and 2019, for a period of three years.

Pauline Ginot is the Chief executive of ACID since September 2021, after having been the Deputy chief executive since 2018.
She was previously working at Autour de Minuit as a development and festivals officer.

Narine Abgaryan (born in Berd, Tavoush Province, Armenia on January 14, 1971) is a Russian writer and blogger of Armenian origin.In 2011, Abgaryan was a nominee of Big Book and Laureate of Yasnaya Polyana Literary Award, Russia, in 2016. She is the author of Manyunya, People Who Are Always With Me,Three Apples Fell from the Sky,Simon, and others. In 2020, The Guardian named her among the brightest authors of Europe.
Abgaryan became a blogger in Life Journal. The stories about a little girl called Manuynya fascinated writer Lara Gall, and she introduced the author to the editor of Astrel-SPb Publishing house.The autobiographical novel Manyunya received The Manuscript of the Year Russian national literary award. Later, the author went on writing a trilogy about the girl called Manyunya. In 2012, Simeon Andreich, Manuscript in Scrawls– was published, illustrated by Victoria Kirdiy.In 2014, Chocolate Granddad was published, co-authored with Valentin Postnikov. It is the only book that she calls a children's book.In August 2015, Abgaryan was called one of two laureates of the Alexander Grin Literature Award "for her outstanding contribution to the national literature development". In March 2020, her novel Three Apples Fell from the Sky was translated into English by Lisa C. Hayden and published by Oneworld Publications. Manyunya was staged by SamArt Youth Theatre, Russia.

Jean-Max Méjean is a writer and critic. He wrote about 30 books about great directors such as Federico Fellini, Woody Allen, Pedro Almodovar, Sergeï Parajanov and Emir Kusturica. He also managed some cinema collective works: Philosophie et cinéma (CinémAction, n°94), Comment parler de cinéma (L’Harmattan), etc. He wrote for Jeune Cinéma, Éclipses and on the website www.iletaitunefoislecinema.com and http://www.jeunecinema.fr. His last publications are: L'Atalante, éditions Gremese, collection Les meilleurs films de notre vie, Rome, 2017; La Grande Vadrouille de Gérard Oury, éditions Gremese, collection Լes Films sélectionnés, Rome, 2020; Bruno Dumont, un funambule de génie (dir.), Jacques Flament alternative éditoriale, La Neuville Aux-Joûtes, 2020.

Davide Magnisi, teacher and film critic, has collaborated with newspapers, magazines, websites and film reviews. He has published three volumes on Stanley Kubrick (Gli orizzonti del cinema di Stanley Kubrick, 2003; Il dottor Stranamore, 2020; Barry Lyndon, 2022), two on Fernando di Leo (Di Leo calibro 9, 2017; Il cinema di Fernando di Leo, 2017), one on Sam Mendes (Sam Mendes. Da Shakespeare a Bond, 2018), one on Ruggero Deodato (Cannibal Ballad, 2019), one on Umberto Lenzi (Il cinema rovente di Umberto Lenzi, 2021) and one on the Vanzina brothers (Il cinema dei fratelli Vanzina, 2022), as well as having taken part in numerous collective books (including, Cineasti di Puglia, 2006-2007; Riccardo Cucciolla, 2012; Il cinema di Domenico Paolella, 2014; Paul. Il cinema di Verhoven, 2021). Member of the SNCCI and of FIPRESCI, he has been part of numerous juries in international film festivals.

In 1983, she graduated from the directing department of the Yerevan State Institute of Art and Theater. From 1984 to 2014, she worked at the Public Television of Armenia as a director, then as the head of the film program and dubbing department. Since 2020, she has been working at the National Cinema Center of Armenia as the head of the applications and protocols department.