2015 Asia Pacific Screen Lab Recipient

Balaka Ghosh is a filmmaker based in Kolkata, India and has been making films for the past 20 years. She received several National Awards and International acclaim for her films. Films about people and social issues are her forte. Her film The Vehicle with the soul of a Man was screened at 27 international film festivals including Cannes, Cinema du Reel, Tampere, Uppsala, Munich, Berlin, San Francisco, Bilbao among others. She had done several projects funded by the Jan Vrijman Fund, IDFA. An empanelled director/producer for a joint social communication Institute of the Indian and Italian Government. Her previous project Mother, Media and Landmines is co-produced by NHK. Her project Red Fairy n the Holy Ghost is funded by Jan Vrijman Fund. Her latest documentary is also being co-produced by NHK Japan.

Vilsoni Hereniko is originally from Rotuma, but lives in Honolulu, Hawai`i. He has an M.Ed. from the University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne in England and a Ph.D. in Literature and Language from USP in Fiji. He is a playwright, screenwriter, stage and film director, and professor. He is a former Director of the Center for Pacific Islands Studies at the University of Hawai`i, and a former Director of the OCACPS as well as Professor of Pacific Studies. He has written several books and edited many scholarly and literary journals. His feature film The Land Has Eyes premiered at the Sundance Film Festival and was Fiji’s entry into the Academy Awards (2005). He now teaches at the University of Hawai`i’s film school, known as the Academy for Creative Media.