Announcing our 2024 Jury Members!

Vladic Ravich is journalist and filmmaker from NYC, currently based in Tbilisi. He covered the rural beat in Azerbaijan, and produced photography, writing, films, and documentaries as part of his reporting in Turkey, Armenia, Kyrgyzstan and Georgia. He is a Fulbright Fellow and a graduate of the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism. He is the founder of Caucasus Cinema, a free and independent non-profit filmmaking intensive in Georgia, which has brought together over 150 filmmakers to create over 320 short films since 2022.

Sofia Afonasina is a director and editor based in Vienna. She grew up in the U.S., Austria and Russia, and studied International Relations before turning her attention towards film-making. In her work, she aims to explore female-centric stories revolving around generational divides, coming of age, migration and ghosts of the past and future. Her latest film The Lion Blanket has been screened at many European film festivals. 

Lukas Ladner wurde 1991 in Innsbruck geboren. Von 2013 bis 2017 studierte er Film- und Fernsehregie an der Filmuniversität Babelsberg Konrad Wolf und hat diese mit dem Kurzfilm „Treibgut“ abgeschlossen. Sein erster Lang- Dokumentarfilm "Eva-Maria" feierte seine Weltpremiere auf dem DOK.fest München und gewann auf der Diagonale'21 den Preis für den besten Nachwuchsfilm. Aktuell arbeitet er von Innsbruck aus an der Schnittstelle zwischen Film und Videokunst und recherchiert für seinen zweiten Langdokumentarfilm
Lukas Ladner was born 1991 in Innsbruck. From 2013 to 2017, he studied film and TV directing at the film university Babelsberg Konrad Wolf and graduated there with the short film Treibgut. He works in the sections of scriptwriting, directing and video arts. His first feature documentary Eva- Maria had its world premiere at DOK.fest Munich and won several prices. His focus is on character studies with occasional tendencies towards experimental film or a hybrid of both. Apart from his own work, he created several festival trailers as well as music videos and experimental theatre plays.