Jurys

Rocío Ayuso (Madrid, Spain) is a writer, journalist and film producer. Foreign correspondent for the past 25 years, first in London and later in Los Angeles, Rocío Ayuso has a long career in different news outlets, from Spanish News Agency EFE to Canal Plus and monthly movie magazines like Fotogramas or the Spanish leading newspaper El Pais. Holding a B.A. degree in Journalism and Psychology, nowadays she is based in Los Angeles where she is a member of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association and instrumental in the organization of the annual Golden Globes Awards Ceremony. Rocío Ayuso has also written several books like “La guerra en directo”, “Jack Mircala and The Art of Extraordinary Tales” and “Bill Plympton, el cineasta incansable” and through her company, R&R Communications, she has extended her work to the promotion of Spanish cinema in Los Angeles. Rocío Ayuso is also executive producer of the animated film, “Extraordinary Tales”, and her next work in this field will be “Bitten”, inspired on a short story by German writer Cornelia Funke.

Cav Bøgelund (*1978) has a degree in character animation from The Animation Workshop in Viborg, Denmark. On top of this, Cav Bøgelund graduated as animation director from The National Film School of Denmark in 2008. Apart from his work with film, Cav Bøgelund has written, illustrated and edited a series of comics, along with doing illustration and graphic facilitation for years. In 2012, Cav Bøgelund helped to create a bachelor’s degree in graphic storytelling at The Animation Workshop and he now serves at the schools advisory board.
Cav Bøgelund has directed Film Maker’s animated short film “Brothers In Arms”, which won the talent award for animation at Odense International Film Festival in 2014, and was nominated for best short film at the Danish Academy Award the same year. At the moment, Cav Bøgelund is developing Film Maker’s animated short film, “The Glass Girl”, with scriptwriter Søren Grinderslev.

Špela Čadež was born in Slovenia. After graduating in Graphic Design in 2002, she continued her studies at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne, Germany. During her studies, she made two puppet animations that gained international recognition; Mate to Measure, (2004) and Lovesick, (2007). Since 2008 Špela Čadež has been working as an independent animation film director and producer. Her latest film, Boles, has been screened worldwide, receiving 50 awards, distinctions and nominations.

Jalal Maghout is an independent filmmaker from Syria who started his film career after receiving a bachelor’s degree in visual communication from Damascus University 2010. He has produced and directed a variety of short animated films that were played at festivals around the world, including his most recent film “Suleima”- an animated documentary which has been selected amongst others for: Dok-Leipzig, Stuttgart International Festival of Animated Film and ANNECY International Animation Film Festival.

Besides films, he also has an experience in music videos, caricature, comics and painting. And before moving to Berlin in 2013 he has been working as a teacher at the Damascus University.

Having completed a degree in Communications Design, Till Penzek (*1976) worked on many projects for German television as a freelance writer and animator, to include more than 50 animated films for “extra 3”, a satirical television programme. Since 2009, he has been creating digital effects for the German version of “Sesame Street. Nowadayas, Till Penzek is also working in the field of children’s media. In 2015, he published his first two books for children. In addition, he works as a lecturer and organizer of various readings and workshops for children as well as seminars for adults.

Animation producer, distributor and curator Ron Diamond founded and runs Acme Filmworks in Los Angeles, CA, one of the preeminent independent animation studios since 1990 creating seminal animated works with such directors as Michael Dudok de Wit, Christopher Hinton, Janet Perlman, Raimund Krumme, Caroline Leaf, Wendy Tilby and Amanda Forbis, Aleksandra Korejwo and dozens of other animators from around the globe. Diamond has produced commercials, main title sequence, short films, a television series and several animated features, including The 17th Annual Animation Show of Shows, the International Tournee ofAnimation and the Animation Celebration. Diamond has served on numerous festival juries, curated multiple programs, lectured at numerous universities, exhibited Acme Filmworks production art work on four continents and has been in attendance at dozens of  international animation festivals small and large. Diamond is also the co founder of Animation World Network, the founder of The Animation Show of Shows, Inc. and organizes the annual Pre-Oscar tour of the leading animation studios for animated short film Oscar® nominees.

Neyla Majdalani obtained her Master’s degree in Advertising from ALBA – Académie Libanaise des Beaux-Arts – in Beirut. She worked in the advertising field before returning to ALBA as the Administrative Officer of the Graphic Arts and Advertising Department, which offers studies in five artistic domains: Advertising, Multimedia, Photography, Illustration and Animation.

Over the years, Neyla created contacts between Alba and different festivals around the world. She participated in the organization of the 4th edition of the Beirut Animated Festival and is currently involved in the upcoming first edition of the Maskoon Fantastic Film Festival.

This proximity with the industry has allowed her to organize successful workshops with guests ranging from local and regional artists to a more international selection such as U.S independent animator Bill Plympton, and Portuguese animator Regina Pessoa.

Johannes Schiehsl was born in 1984 in Wiener Neustadt in Lower Austria. He made his first animated films as a child, using Lego bricks and coloured paper. Having completed his studies at Höhere Graphische Bundes-Lehr- und Versuchsanstalt in Vienna, he studied traditional animation techniques in the Czech Republic, followed by further studies at Filmakademie Baden-Württemberg. His graduation film “366 Tage” was screened at numerous international festivals and received several awards. In 2011 he founded  “Neuer Österreichischer Trickfilm” , together with his colleagues Benjamin Swiczinsky and Conrad Tambour, a group producing narrative animated films in Vienna. As a director, his projects include the popular television series “Hexe Lilli”, as well as various animations for festivals, cinema and TV.

Cairo-based filmmaker Marianne Khoury gravitated towards the cinema world soon after graduating. For more than three decades, Marianne Koury has been a close collaborator of iconic filmmaker Youssef Chahine. In 2010, she directed “Zelal”, individual and societal perceptions of the mentally ill, raising questions about the concept of madness itself. The film was an official entry in the Venice Film Festival and won the FIPRESCI at the Dubai Film Festival and the RAI Broadcasting award at PRIMED 2011. In 2014, she founded Zawya, the first art house cinema opened in Egypt. Her last project Misr Film Focus, is dedicated to the development and production of the films made by emerging Egyptian talent, though workshops and mentoring. She is currently producing and co-directing “Ghost of The City”, a contemporary musical film project taking place in the slums of Cairo, in the midst of the revolution.

Esben Toft Jacobsen graduated from The National Film School of Denmark as Animation Director in 2006 with the graduation film “Having a Brother” about the hedgehog Morten who wants to get rid of his baby brother. The film was awarded a special mention at the Berlinale’s children’s section, Generation Kplus. Since 2008, Esben Toft Jacobsen has been working with Copenhagen Bombay, directing such titles as the short “Kiwi & Strit “for “Carsten & Gitte’s Movie Madness” and “The Great Bear,” which was picked for competition for Berlinale’s Generation Kplus. “The Great Bear” premiered in Denmark in February of 2011 and garnered very positive reviews and several international awards. “Beyond Beyond” was in competition at the Berlinale 2014 in the Kplus section and was sold to more than 20 countries. In December 2015 Esben Toft Jacobsen finished his 26 episode TV series “Kiwi & Strit”, which will be on national television in Germany, Sweden, Finland and Denmark.

Ralf Schenk (*1956) studied journalism at Leipzig University from 1975 to 1979. As a film critic and historian, he is a regular staff member of daily newspaper “Berliner Zeitung” and the magazine “FILMDIENST”. He also gives guest lectures and seminars at universities in Germany, Canada, Austria, Argentinia, Japan, and the USA. Ralf Schenk published around twenty books on film history, and reconstructed the banned DEFA films “Die Schönste” (1958/2000), “Fräulein Schmetterling” (1965/2005), “Hände hoch oder ich schieße“ (1966/2009), and “Sommerwege“ (1960/2014). Since 2004, Ralf Schenk has been a member of the selection committee for the Berlinale competition. He received a honorary doctorate from the Film University Babelsberg KONRAD WOLF in 2011. Since 2012, Ralf Schenk has been chairman of the DEFA Foundation.

Nick Cross was awarded an Emmy for “Over the Garden Wall”. He is a canadian animator and for almost twenty years, he has been directing and producing animated content for various film and television productions. Also, as an independent filmmaker, Nick Cross’films have been screened at festivals all over the world. He currently lives in Los Angeles where he works as art director for the Cartoon Network shorts program.

Raúl was born in Madrid starting his animation career very early. He’s been an animator at international feature films ranging from «Asterix and Caesar Surprise», «The Chipmunks Great Adventure» and «Land before  time» until he worked on «Who Framed Roger Rabbit», opening the doors as animator in the Walt Disney Studios for 9 years.

He was character animator on such modern classics as «Beauty and the Beast», «Aladdin», «Lion King», «Hunchback of Notre Dame», «Hercules» and  «Pocahontas». After «Fantasia 2000» Raúl moved as sequence director for Paramount on films like «The Rugrats in Paris», «The Wild Thornberries Movie» and «Jimmy Neutron Boy Genius» nominated for an Oscar for best animated feature.

In 2002 he joined Kandor Graphics as creative director, with the award winning short film «The Tell Tale Heart», and soon afterwards as co-writer and director with his partner Manuel Sicilia on the feature film «The Missing Lynx”. As part of Kandor Moon, a joint venture with Antonio Banderas’ production company, he produced the Academy Award Nominee short film “The Lady and the Reaper”. In the field of TV animation he developed the TV series “Low Standards” for Fox TV.

As  director and producer he’s at the helm of  the Animated Feature “Extraordinary Tales”  based on Edgar Allan Poe stories. One of the short pieces from the film “The Fall of the House of Usher” was shortlisted in 2012 Academy Award for best animated short film. In 2015 he was nominated as Best Director of a Feature Animated Film at the ANNIE Awards.

He is currently developing   the animated feature film “Bitten” based on Cornelia Funke’s famous children book “Little werewolf”

Raul Garcia is member of the Academy of Motion Pictures of Arts and Sciences of Hollywood , The Writers Guild of America, The American Cartoonist Society, and  Asifa Hollywood .

He has published two books in animation techniques and teaches animation around the world.

Eric Shaw is an Emmy-winning television writer who has worked for such animation studios as Warner Bros., Nickelodeon, and Walt Disney TV Animation.  He was a Staff Writer on the global mega-hit “SpongeBob SquarePants” and has also written for Jim Henson’s “Sid the Science Kid” as well as “Olivia”, “Arthur” and “Xiaolin Showdown”.  Eric went on to serve as Head Writer of the Emmy Award-winning PBS series “WordGirl”, for which he took home the “Outstanding Writing in an Animation Series” Emmy in 2013. Recently, Eric was a Co-Head Writer on the highly anticipated original Netflix series, “Cirque du Soleil’s Luna Petunia” to premier at the end of 2016.

Michaela Pavlátová is an animation director from Czech Republic. Her films, such as “Words, words, words“, “Repete“ and “Tram“,  have received numerous awards at international film festivals, including an Oscar nomination, Annecy Cristal, Golden Bear in Berlinale, Grand Prix at the International Animation Festival Hiroshima. Besides animation, Michaela Pavlátová directed live action feature films, makes illustrations and works in the field of theatre. Since 2016 she is a chair of the Animation Department of the Film and TV School of the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague (FAMU).

Puneet Sharma is the Festival Director of ORBIT LIVE, India’s most popular International Student Animation Festival and the Joint Secretary of The Animation Society of India (TASI). He is also the head of the Industry-Academia Advisory Panel at Aptech Limited in Mumbai and has been part of both Production & Education. With over 20 years of experience, he has worked with numerous Television Channels, Animation Studios & Multimedia Productions.

Conrad Tambour, born in Vienna, graduated from the Höhere Graphische Bundes- Lehr und Versuchsanstalt Wien, where he also was trained as a graphic designer. During school he did several internships at advertising agencies such as Demner, Merlicek and Bergman.

In 2002, together with Johannes Schiehsl, he released their computer game “Professor Brösl”, which was nominated for the Golden Nica in the category u19 at the Ars-Electronica. In 2004 he was an animator for the Kunstuniversität Linz’s e-learning project DMA. Between 2005 and 2010 he studied animation at the Filmakademie Baden-Württemberg. His 2010 graduation film “Der Besuch” screened at more than 70 international Festivals, such as the Stuttgart Festival of Animated Film and Animafest Zagreb, and won several awards.

In 2010 Conrad Tambour founded “Neuer Österreichischer Trickfilm” together with his fellow students Benjamin Swiczinsky and Johannes Schiehsl. Tambour works as a director for the TV series “Hexe Lilli” and is part of a group of artists advocating the revival of the narrative animated film in Austria. Conrad Tambour holds an Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau Award and teaches story development at the higher education institute Hagenberg.

Giannalberto Bendazzi, currently an indipendent scholar, is a former Visiting Professor of History of Animation at the Nanyang Technological University in Singapore and a former professor at the Università degli Studi di Milano. Bendazzi started his career as a journalist and always was an independent, self-funded scholar. He turned to full-time academic teaching by the end of the 1990s and has lectured extensively in all continents. An Italian by birth, Bendazzi’s best efforts are devoted to international projects. An acclaimed author in his sphere, his best known book is “Cartoons: 100 Years of Cinema Animation”, a world history of the medium published in Italian, English, French, Spanish and Persian. Bendazzi also wrote “Alexeieff – Itinéraire d’un maître / Itinerary of a Master”, devoted to the famous auteur of avant-garde short films. Bendazzi‘s prolific written works include live-action cinema, especially comedy, as shown by his books “The Films of Woody Allen” and “Mel Brooks”. His most recent book “Animation – A world history” in three volumes and overall 1456 pages among other things shows, that his principal passion and dedication remain animation. In order to promote this medium Bendazzi writes books, retrospectives, articles, essays, contributes to and participates in festivals, delivers lectures, classes and so on. Giannalberto Bendazzi does not love animation as a collector loves his stamps or a fan loves his football team. He deeply admires this art that has always been underestimated, or even neglected, and therefore deserves a special praise.

Animation producer, distributor and curator Ron Diamond founded and runs Acme Filmworks in Los Angeles, CA, one of the preeminent independent animation studios since 1990 creating seminal animated works with such directors as Michael Dudok de Wit, Christopher Hinton, Janet Perlman, Raimund Krumme, Caroline Leaf, Wendy Tilby and Amanda Forbis, Aleksandra Korejwo and dozens of other animators from around the globe. Diamond has produced commercials, main title sequence, short films, a television series and several animated features, including “The 17th Annual Animation Show of Shows”, “The International Tournee ofAnimation” and “The Animation Celebration”. Diamond has served on numerous festival juries, curated multiple programs, lectured at numerous universities, exhibited Acme Filmworks production art work on four continents and has been in attendance at dozens of international animation festivals small and large. Diamond is also the co founder of Animation World Network, the founder of The Animation Show of Shows, Inc. and organizes the annual Pre-Oscar tour of the leading animation studios for animated short film Oscar® nominees.

Christina Schindler founded her own animation production company in Berlin after she graduated from the Hochschule für bildende Künste Kassel (Kassel Art University). Since 1998 she directs and produces animated films such as “Aus-Flug”, “Nachts sind alle Katzen bunt”, “Zugvögel”, “Rinnsteinpiraten” and “Anders-Artig” which have been awarded with the Goldener Spatz, the Prix Jeunesse International, the Crystal Bear of the Berlinale and the Murnau Kurzfilmpreis. Since 2002 she teaches as a professor at the Filmuniversität Babelsberg Konrad Wolf where she is Head of the Animation department since 2004.

Jalal Maghout is an independent filmmaker from Syria who started his film career after receiving a bachelor’s degree in visual communication from Damascus University 2010. He has produced and directed a variety of short animated films that were played at festivals around the world, including his most recent film “Suleima”- an animated documentary which has been selected amongst others for: Dok-Leipzig, Stuttgart International Festival of Animated Film and ANNECY International Animation Film Festival. Besides films, he also has an experience in music videos, caricature, comics and painting. And before moving to Berlin in 2013 he has been working as a teacher at the Damascus University.