Emily Avila, Lara Kose, Goran Stolevski and Thomas Baricevic are the four recipients of Sydney Film Festival’s 2017 Lexus Australia Short Film Fellowship.
Each filmmaker will receive $50,000 to make a short to premiere at next year’s festival.
Actor-director David Wenham, who presided over the fellowship’s selection process as jury chair, said each of the four had shown “considerable tenacity” and drive in the early years of their careers.
“What is really exciting is each filmmaker’s strong commitment to telling diverse stories. I’m thrilled we have four young talented Australian filmmakers with such unique perspectives and a passion to create meaningful works that will connect and resonate with Australian and global audiences,” he said.
The fellows were selected from a shortlist of over 20 emerging filmmakers. Sydney Film Festival director Nashen Moodley said the jury believed the chosen fellows were ready to take the next step in their careers.
“The fellows have had some exceptional filmmaking experience already, and have shown a commitment to the industry and community,” he said.
Brisbane-based Avila, a former assistant to See-Saw Film’s Emile Sherman, made her directorial debut with In A Cane Field, which premiered at the Brisbane Asia Pacific Film Festival and has won two short film awards.
Kose, a Melbourne-based writer-director-editor has had her short film Crush screen internationally and was nominated for an Australian Screen Editors Award.
Stolevski was selected for this year’s Berlinale Talent Campus and has made over 20 short films. In 2014 he was supported via Screen Australia’s Talent Escalator initiative to shadow director on Nowhere Boys.
Baricevic is a Melbourne-based screenwriter-director-producer who has created films, documentaries and music videos. He runs production company Jackson Black Films.
This year’s fellowships were announced as last year’s recipients – Anya Beyersdorf, Brooke Goldfinch, Alex Ryan and Alex Murawski – had their shorts How the Light Gets In, Outbreak Generation, Red Ink and Snow screen. (Read our interviews with Beyersdorf and Goldfinch about the making of their films).