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People
Africa in Motion was initiated and is organised and managed by Stop and Stir Arts Ltd, a small Edinburgh-based not-for-profit company. The company grew out of its founders' passion for and interest in African film and a strong desire to make marginalised and under-represented art more widely available to Scottish audiences.
Founding directors
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Board of Advisors
AiM's Board of Advisors provides specialist advice on the organisation of the event. The Board consists of:
- Mark Cousins: High-profile Film Critic and author of The Story of Film (2004)
- David Murphy: Senior Lecturer at the University of Stirling's School of Languages, Cultures and Religions
- Paul Nugent: Professor of Comparative African History and Director of the University of Edinburgh's Centre of African Studies
- Noe Mendelle: Head of Film and TV at the Edinburgh College of Art and Director of the Scottish Documentary Institute
Supporters
British documentary-maker Kim Longinotto is an official supporter of AiM. Kim has made a number of films in Africa, the most recent Sisters in Law, on female Cameroonian legal workers, which had sold-out screenings in Edinburgh.
Volunteers
- Vale Benson: Synopsis Writing
- Kati Clark: Events Organisation
- Rohan Crickmar: Synopsis Writing
- Jess Dolan: Press Officer
- Ines Gennuso: Photographer
- Charlotte Hastings: Database Management and Events Organisation
- Michal Hefer: Graphic and Web Design
- Karen Kangro: Print Research
- Margaret Malcolm: Administration
- Julie McIntosh: Volunteer
- Mara Menzies: Events Organisation
- Wezi Mhura: Events Organisation
- Elisa Peduto: Press Officer
- Samantha Rankin: Educational Events Organisations
- Robert Richards: Press Archiving
- Louise Ross: Delegate co-ordination and Documentary-making
- Paula Poveda-Urrutia: Documentary-making
- Philippa Smith: Educational Events Organisation and Partnerships Development
- Leo Wood: Press Officer
Volunteers' biographies
- Vale Benson - Vale Benson has a degree in Literature and has worked for over twenty years in adult education, teaching English to speakers of other languages along with running assertiveness training and autobiographical writing courses. A writer of short fiction, her most recently published work is a South African-based short story, Initiation at Graaff-Reinet which is included in the Asham Award anthology Don't Know A Good Thing published earlier this year by Bloomsbury.
- Jess Dolan - Jess gained her BA (Hons) from the University of Leeds in Literature and History of Art and has subsequently received a Masters degree in Cultural Studies (distinction) from the University of Edinburgh. Having worked in the arts for several years in a variety of roles ranging from gallery assistant through to art columnist for MAP magazine, she has more recently been working in the field of human rights for Amnesty International in Scotland. Jess also has extensive experience of arts festival organisation and management. She has worked for the Edinburgh Film Festival, collaborated with others to produce Stand Up for Freedom, Amnesty International's flagship comedy show at the Edinburgh Fringe, freelanced for two years at the Imaginate Children's Performing Arts Festival and been tour manager for the Shetland Isles leg of the Children's Festival.
- Ines Gennuso - Ines was born in Italy, where her family settled down after leaving their native Eritrea. She has completed this year her BA (Hons) in Photography from Napier University. While taking a gap year before completing her degree she has been working as assistant photographer in Scotland, gaining experience in commercial and editorial photography, as well as undertaking her own assignments mainly for theatre productions. Since graduating she has worked as stills photographer for Raw Cuts, a series of short films based on the stories submitted by teenagers from the whole UK, which will be broadcast on Channel Four in the autumn. She has also taken part in creative workshops organised by Zele Theatre, where teenagers were encouraged through games and social interaction to explore their acting skills. The workshops led to the teenagers� participation in the play �Bintou� staged at North Edinburgh Arts Centre last July. She currently works as freelance photographer while also teaching Italian.
- Charlotte Hastings - Charlotte is an MSc student at the Centre of African Studies. Her particular area of interest is early 20th Century Nigeria, particularly education. Prior to taking up postgraduate study Charlotte worked in the not for profit sector as a grants administrator. Her favourite film is Before Sunrise.
- Karen Kangro - Karen was born and bred in Estonia, and studied languages, literature and history in high school. This track took her down to Scotland to study Film and TV in Glasgow University. At home, she established her own organisation "Generating Ideas" with a bunch of friends three years ago since she is interested in social issues and human rights. This organisation belongs to a world-wide group of organisations called Global Voice (www.globalvoice.org.uk). She plays the tenor saxophone and the clarinet, paints and has a plan of making her first documentary this summer.
- Julie McIntosh - In her earlier life Julie completed an Honours degree in Social Policy and post-graduate Diploma in Housing Studies at the University of Stirling, before working for over 10 years as an area housing officer for un/supported tenants and a national housing policy and practice officer. She is presently enjoying the Access to Industry HE Certificate in the Creative Industries course being facilitated by the Edinburgh, Napier and Queen Margaret College Universities. Producing and co-ordinating the successful fundraising drive for the 2003 Fringe Festival Hill Street International Theatre 'Scottish' play (a contemporary adaptation of One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest) was her first (voluntary) creative project co-ordination. She has also enjoyed several theatrical improvisational appearances and is looking forward to expanding her performance arts abilities generally. Julie was born in South Africa but left to live in Scotland at the age of seven.
- Mara Menzies - Mara has an extensive background in the promotion of African culture. She has been involved in organising successful African shows, festivals and events throughout Scotland. She graduated with a BA Hons in Marketing and French and has since worked in a variety of fields across the world including Madagascar, France and Cambodia. Two of her greatest interests are International Development and Media and she has worked on a number of BBC radio and television programs.
- Elisa Peduto - Elisa is an Italian-German freelance journalist. She graduated from the University 'La Sapienza' in Rome in 2004, gaining a degree in Communication. Following 18 months as an intern at RTL's news departments in Germany and London and at the BBC Office in Rome, she qualified as a Professional Journalist in the Italian Union of Journalists in 2005. She moved to Edinburgh in January 2006 and attended post-graduates courses in Screenwriting and British Cinema at the University of Edinburgh. Her real passion is working in broadcasting and she has been working from Italy as a producer for the German news RTL TV. She currently writes for Positive News in the UK and for Il Difensore Civico in Italy.
- Paula Poveda-Urrutia - Born and raised in Spain, Paula spent her first few years in Santiago de Chile and lived in Madrid thereafter where she studied drama. She studied Arts in Seattle and Miami and is currently studying Film and Media at the University of Stirling. Paula worked and volunteer in a few film festivals around the world and is really looking forward to Africa in Motion. When she grows up she wants to be second assistant director or a secluded writer in a small hut in the Highlands.
- Louise Ross - Louise. K. Ross has a BA (Hons.) degree in English Literature from Glasgow University. In a previous life she lived in France and Boston, MA where she studied acting at Boston University. She has worked for the Edinburgh International Film Festival for the past four summers, participated in various home-grown film productions and dabbles in photography. She plans on film festival hopping for the next year and hopes to figure out what she wants to be when she grows up.
- Philippa Smith - After (mis)spending her early twenties as a musician travelling around Europe and the States, Philippa gained a wide range of experience working in the arts in a variety of roles - from running an independent recording studio in Glasgow (Million Pounds Studio) to front of house management at the Bard in the Botanics Festival and now as a research assistant at the Centre for Cultural Policy Research. In 2005 Philippa gained her MA (First Class Hons) in English Literature and Film & Television Studies from the University of Glasgow, where she is now studying for an MLitt in Film Studies. This October, Philippa will begin her PhD which will explore the role of documentary in recent peripheral and diasporic narrative cinema.
- Leo Wood - Having completed an MA Hons degree in English Literature at Edinburgh Uni, Leo has spent a year or so building her experience in arts festival organisation and management. Leo has just finished working as Press Office Manager at the Edinburgh International Festival and back in April 2006, was working as a Youth Zone volunteer at HIFA (Harare International Festival of the Arts) in Zimbabwe and as a result is really excited to learn more about African culture through film at AiM. Leo also has worked at literary festivals; at the Hay Literary Festival two years on the trot and also for the same company, running the box office at the Hay literary festival in Deia, Mallorca in October 2005. With a bit of arts journalism experience also under her belt, being a regular contributor for The Skinny Magazine and doing lots of arts reviewing with Three Weeks during the Edinburgh Festivals 2005/06, Leo is looking forward to getting her hands dirty running the press office for this exciting new film festival.
AiM is funded by
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