our collaborators
Katie Quan +
Chinatown Shorts "Real Soul" episode (Co-Director)
Born and raised on Ramaytush Ohlone land (now known as San Francisco), Katie Quan (she/her) is a third generation Chinese American. She is an artist, community advocate, curator, storyteller, and educator. Her comics and illustrations capture the multidimensionality of Asian America, exploring themes like self identity, mental health, and family.
Her work has been exhibited at SF Zinefest, Kearny Street Workshop’s APAture, A PLACE of Her Own, and Chinese Historical Society of America. She is a recent recipient of the Youth Speaks and California Arts Council’s Individual Artist Fellowship as an Emerging Artist. She currently serves on the advisory board to the AAWAA and newsletter editor to the Square and Circle Club. In her free time, you can find her drawing, bouldering, or swatting gnats away from her indoor plants. Visit Real Soul for more info!
Anna Oh +
Chinatown Shorts "Ms. Penny Wong" episode (Co-Director, Editor)
Anna Oh is the co-director/editor of “Penny Wong/Ms. Chinatown” segment in You Are Here who met James while screening her own short film, "Halmoni", at the Boston Asian American Film Festival in 2016. She's also screened her shorts previously at CAAMFest and is a local resident of San Francisco.
Emma Marie Chiang +
Chinatown Shorts: "Master Kuo", "Victor Tung"(Camera), "Banquet Hall" (Director, Camera)
Emma Marie Chiang is an independent filmmaker and photographer and proud San Francisco native. Emma focuses on documenting stories of displaced communities and cares about the rights of marginalized people. She believes storytelling has the power to plant seeds of curiosity, dialogue, inclusion, reconciliation and hope between individuals and communities. Emma recently completed a two-year long documentary project called Coming Home: The 990 Pacific Relocation Story, in partnership the nonprofit, Chinatown Community Development Center (CCDC) capturing the stories of Chinatown public housing residents through a building renovation. She has also produced a series of short stories of San Francisco and Bay Area residents in her column, San Francisco Explored. She received her B.A. in photojournalism and minor in Holistic Health at San Francisco State University, Spring 2016. She has interned at the San Francisco Business Times, San Francisco Examiner, SF Weekly and participated in the Missouri Photo Workshop, Cuba68. Her work has been featured online and in print for various publications and clients such as the AP, SF Chronicle, SF Gate, BuzzFeed News, Vox.com, El Tecolote, Instagram, among others. Emma was awarded second place for the 2017 Multimedia Hearst Journalism Award for her story about a nine-year-old girl living with a rare bone disease, published by the San Francisco Examiner. She loves community storytelling and is a contributor to Everyday Bay Area Instagram collective and neighborhood papers in San Francisco.
Tu David Phu +
Bloodline (Featuring, Executive Producer)
Phu cut his culinary teeth in the kitchens of some of the nation’s top restaurants, including Daniel, Acquerello and Chez Panisse; and across a wide range of cooking cultures - from the American culinary greats to classical European traditions. But it was what he calls “the memory of taste” that pulled him back to his roots: the practices, ingredients, techniques, and flavors of Vietnamese cuisines. Revisiting his favorite childhood dishes, Chef Tu began an in-depth exploration of the cuisine of his mother’s generations-old culinary repertoire. And is passionate about sharing the riches and lessons of his birthright through food.
Harry Chuck +
Chinatown Rising (Director, Producer, Cinematographer)
Former Youth Director and later Executive Director of Cameron House, Harry was an early mentor for hundreds of Chinatown youth including author/activist Gordon Chin. Harry was the catalyst in Chinatown’s fight to save the Chinese Playground from being developed into a parking garage, leading to the formation of the Committee for Better Parks and Recreation in Chinatown. He was co-founder of the Chinatown Coalition for Better Housing, which led the fight to develop the Mei Lun Yuen affordable housing project. He was appointed by four separate mayors to city commissions which included the Public Housing Authority and Juvenile Justice Commission. Harry was one of the first Asian American religious leaders to speak out for same-sex marriage. In 1981, he earned his MA from the SF State University’s Film Arts Department where he served as a p/t student assistant in film history. His footage for this film was shot as a student/activist.
Josh Chuck +
Chinatown Rising (Co-Director, Producer)
Josh grew up in San Francisco's Chinatown and has worked in the community for over 16 years as a youth worker, filmmaker, and fundraiser. He has produced, shot and edited short films for the past 16 years, mostly sharing the stories of individuals who symbolize the rich diversity of the city, as well as organizations advocating for the needs of the underserved. He currently directs the UPS Community Internship in San Francisco, an intensive community immersion program for UPS Upper Management, which focuses on the Chinatown, Tenderloin, and Bayview neighborhoods. He enjoys international travel, often spending months at a time overseas. To Josh, the best part of travel is learning about other cultures, meeting inspiring individuals, and playing basketball with the locals.
Anson Ho +
Chinatown Rising (Cinematographer);
Chinatown Shorts, "Aaron Lim" Episode (Director, Camera)
Anson is a San Francisco native rooted in the Chinatown community. While serving in the US Navy he found his passion in film and tv when he produced and filmed his own closed circuit television show on his naval ship, USS OLDENDORF. He followed his passion by moving to Los Angeles and worked on various short films, music videos and documentary projects. Notable projects included Sundance film FINISHING THE GAME as an associated producer and thereafter worked on Universal's Studio FAST & FURIOUS as an assistant to the director both directed by Justin Lin. He also help develop and film numerous webs-eries and comedy sketches on a Youtube Asian American channel called YOMYOMF which gained over 35 million views within a year. As a traveling cinematographer, he's film documentaries all over China, India, Indonesia, Nepal and Mt Everest base camp. He is currently working on a feature film narrative called SNAKEHEAD as a 1st Assistant Director.
Miles Ito +
Bloodline; Chinatown Rising (Composer)
Award-winning Film, TV, Video Game and Media music composer, Miles Ito, grew up in Los Angeles. Over the past decade, he has scored, recorded, and produced soundtracks and albums for dozens of feature films, commercials, shorts, TV and web series, artists, and video games across multiple genres and platforms. Miles recently won "Best Original Music" in the MINN Webfest 2019, is nominated for Best Original Score in the Rio WebFest 2019, and was nominated in 10th annual Indie Series Awards for his work with "After." He recently composed the score for the critically acclaimed Sundance short, "American Paradise." He won "Best Original Score" at the 8th annual Indie Series Awards ceremony for his music score for "Here We Wait" and was also nominated for "Best Original Score" for the ISA9 Awards, "Best Original Music" by the International Academy of Web Television Awards 2017, and "Best Original Score" in the Die Seriale Festival 2017. Miles' music and versatile style is unique and highly engaging. His music can sweep you from the sweet calm of a mid-summer's day to an instance of relentless heart-aching passion and yearning.
Corey Tong +
Forever, Chinatown (Producer)
Corey Tong is a film and media producer, public relations and programming/acquisitions consultant, guest lecturer, producers representative. He has two series in development in New Zealand and Brazil, and his films as producer or rep have screened on PBS and other international broadcasters or theatrical venues in over 20 countries. He is the former director of the San Francisco Int’l Asian American Film Festival (CAAM) and former IFFCON director of special projects (co-production, development market). Corey is originally from Hawaii and is based in San Francisco and Honolulu, and also has a professional background in architecture and design.
Jeff Den Broeder +
Forever, Chinatown (Cinematographer); Bloodline (Editor); Chinatown Shorts (Editor)
Jeff is an Emmy-nominated filmmaker and Environmental Communications lecturer at Stanford’s School of Earth, Energy, and Environmental Sciences. Equally comfortable as a director, cinematographer, and editor, Jeff has a history of working in documentary, news, and corporate film. He has increasingly focused his passion for storytelling on the people, organizations, and companies driven to develop solutions to the climate crisis. He also loves being a dad.
Michael Palmieri +
Forever, Chinatown (Editor; Miniature Cinematographer)
Michael Palmieri is a director, cinematographer and editor. His first two feature length documentaries, "OCTOBER COUNTRY" and "OFF LABEL" were directing collaborations with the filmmaker and photographer Donal Mosher and have won numerous awards both in the US and abroad, including Best U.S. Documentary at Silverdocs and an Independent Spirit Award nomination for best documentary in 2009 for their first film "October Country". He also directs commercials and music videos and resides in Portland, Oregon. A wide selection of Mr. Palmieri's work can be found at michaelpalmieri.com
Donal Mosher +
Forever, Chinatown (Assistant Editor)
Donal Mosher is a filmmaker, photographer, writer, and musician. He is the collaborative director (with Michael Palmieri) of the award wining documentary features OCTOBER COUNTRY, OFF LABEL and the shorts ROUGAROUING, MARSEILLES (commissioned by Vision Du Reel Festival) and PEACE In The Valley (commissioned by Field of Vision.) Alongside filmmaking he has published fiction, non-fiction, and reviews including a contribution to the LAMBDA Award winning anthology PORTLAND QUEER. His recent photographic work The Vibrancy Is Killing Me was on exhibition in Munich, Germany in Dec 2014. Selections of his film, writing, and photographic work can be found at ghostype.blogspot.com and donalmosher.org
Thomas Lauderdale/Pink Martini +
Forever, Chinatown (Original Music & Score)
Thomas Lauderdale was raised on a plant nursery in rural Indiana. He began piano lessons at age six with Patricia Garrison. When his family moved to Portland in 1982, he began studying with Sylvia Killman, who to this day continues to serve as his coach and mentor. Active in Oregon politics since a student at U.S. Grant High School, Thomas served under Portland Mayor Bud Clark and Oregon governor Neil Goldschmidt. Instead of running for political office, Lauderdale founded the “little orchestra” called Pink Martini in 1994 to play political fundraisers for progressive causes such as civil rights, the environment, affordable housing and public broadcasting. In addition to his work with Pink Martini, Lauderdale collaborates with international superstar and singing sensation Meow Meow, the surf band Satan’s Pilgrims and novelist/writer Tom Spanbauer. Lauderdale currently serves on the boards of the Oregon Symphony and Pioneer Courthouse Square. He lives in Portland, Oregon.
Penelope Wong +
Forever, Chinatown (Associate Producer)
With 25+ years in marketing & branding, Penelope Wong was CEO of Wong•Wong•Boyack (acquired by Havas), a relationship marketing firm, with clients NIKE, Cisco, Hewlett-Packard, Wells Fargo, SF Giants, Visa, sina.com, and Disney. Previously with Ogilvy & Mather Direct, other clients have included Pixar, Mattel, and Amex. She also developed and personified the brand “Jennifer Wong” for The Franklin Mint.
An author/writer on the subject of everything from food to fashion and change management, Wong is now focused on film. An award-winning screenwriter for “The Shanghai Café” (based on her grandfather’s spending 10 years in San Quentin for a murder he did NOT commit), she is at work on a narrative short about her parents titled “The Other Wife.”
She serves on the board of San Francisco Film Society, Oakland Museum of California, Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History, and the Greater San Francisco YMCA. She and her husband, Tim Kochis, reside in both San Francisco and Santa Barbara.
Jeremiah Moore +
Chinatown Rising; Forever, Chinatown (Sound Design, Sound Mix)
Jeremiah Moore designs, edits, and mixes sound at Jeremiah Moore Sound, his San Francisco studio. He works across the disciplines of film, theater, radio, interactive, mobile, and site-specific installation, with attention to environment, detail, and creative process. He is currently working on a year-long sound-image timelapse of urban trees with Rachel Strickland, and has created sonic experiences for The Residents (Eskimo in Constellation Surround, Exploratorium) and Ai WeiWei (@LARGE, Alcatraz). He has provided sound design and mix for many documentary films including 2014 Oscar-shortlisted “Slomo” (dir. Josh Izenberg, prod. Amanda Micheli), and 2016 Oscar Nominee “Last Day of Freedom” (dir. Dee Hibbert-Jones and Nomi Talisman).
Melanie Ide +
Forever, Chinatown (Project Advisor)
Melanie Y. Ide is a Principal at Ralph Appelbaum Associates, Inc., a multi-disciplinary, international planning and design firm with active projects in over twenty countries. Melanie is currently designing exhibitions for the new National Museum of African American History and Culture (Smithsonian Inst.) in Washington, D.C., recently opened Pacific Hall at the Bernice Pauahi Bishop Museum in Honolulu, and is helping to plan a new modern and contemporary art museum in the Middle East/North Africa region. Her built work, which has spanned natural history, cultural history, art, science and technology, has garnered over three dozen awards and has been featured in numerous publications. Originally from the San Francisco Bay Area and Hawaii, Melanie has taught graduate and undergraduate courses at Parsons The New School for Design and is an architect now based in New York.
Chi-hui Yang +
Forever, Chinatown (Project Advisor)
Chi-hui Yang, an acclaimed curator, film scholar, and educator, makes grants in film, new media, and visual storytelling for the foundation’s JustFilms program. He has global experience in supporting emerging artists and in the wider field of independent film.
Before joining the foundation in 2015, Chi-hui worked extensively as a film and video curator, including as a selection committee member for MoMA’s Documentary Fortnight, consulting series producer for PBS’s POV, and curator of Comcast’s Cinema Asian America video-on-demand service. Among his independently curated programs are the 2008 Flaherty Film Seminar, “The Age of Migration,” and the 2014 film series and symposium Lines and Modes: Media, Infrastructure, and Aesthetics. From 2000 to 2012, he was director of the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival, the largest event of its kind in the nation.
Chi-hui has served as an adjunct professor in the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and Hunter College Asian American Studies Program and is an instructor at the UnionDocs Center for Documentary Art. His recent pedagogical projects include the Oberhausen Seminar, a convening exploring experimental and artists’ cinema at the International Short Film Festival Oberhausen, and the NEH-funded Summer Seminar for K-12 educators “Asian Americans in New York: Film and Literature.”
Chi-hui is president of the Flaherty Film Seminar’s board of trustees and an advisory board member of the Firelight Media Producers’ Lab. He earned a master’s degree in film studies from San Francisco State University and a bachelor’s degree in political science from Stanford University.
Santhosh Daniel +
Bloodline (Co-Director, Executive Producer); Forever, Chinatown (Project Advisor)
Santhosh Daniel is a writer, producer and creative consultant specializing in strategic communications, social enterprise and independent media and arts. He is founder of the creative collective Compound and co-founder of Projector, a social innovation and storytelling media initiative. His professional experience includes work with The Global Film Initiative as well as partners such as Smithsonian, Medium, Virgin America and U.S. Department of State, and also creation of the original children’s series Red Violet and CityStudio, a multi-disciplinary urban identity and creative media project. Santhosh currently serves on the Board of Directors for Cal Humanities and as Board President for the Puerto Rico Film Society, and has also served as an expert panelist for various media funds, including the San Francisco Arts Commission, European Audiovisual Entrepreneurs, California Documentary Project and Headlands Artist Residency. He has a B.A. in English from the University of Washington and a M.F.A. in English from the University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop.
Rob Epstein & Jeffrey Friedman +
Forever, Chinatown (Project Advisors)
For decades, the queer experience on-screen was defined by invisibility and marginalization. The trailblazing works of Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman have been instrumental in changing that. Since the 1970s, when he contributed to the Mariposa Collective’s WORD IS OUT—a landmark documentary that shattered the public silence around LGBTQ lives in America—Epstein has been telling powerful stories that center the gay experience. In the late eighties, he teamed up with Friedman to form the production company Telling Pictures, and the pair’s subsequent triumphs include an Academy Award–winning AIDS documentary (COMMON THREADS: STORIES FROM THE QUILT), a groundbreaking revisionist history of Hollywood (THE CELLULOID CLOSET), and a narrative retelling of Allen Ginsberg’s 1957 obscenity trial (HOWL). Urgent, stirring, and deeply humane, these films represent a major turning point in the cultural conversation surrounding LGBTQ issues and acceptance. (From Criterion Channel "The Films of Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman")
Pamela Kong +
Good Medicine Legal Counsel; Project Advisor (Forever, Chinatown & Chinatown Rising)
Pamela Kong is a workers' and tenants' rights attorney at the law firm of Sundeen and Salinas in Oakland, California. Born in Chinese Hospital in San Francisco, she received a bilingual education at St. Mary's Chinese Day School, played on the floors of San Francisco's garment factories where her grandmother's friends worked and came full circle in 2003 at the Women's Employment Rights Clinic when she joined the trial team representing almost 300 monolingual Cantonese garment workers in a lawsuit to recover unpaid wages.
Since then, she has steadily provided legal services to the Chinese Community through volunteering with Asian Americans Advancing Justice - Asian Law Caucus and her own legal practice. Most recently, her law firm is co-counsel with the Asian Law Caucus to largely monolingual Cantonese tenants of an SRO in Oakland Chinatown who have filed a lawsuit against their landlord. She earned her B.A. in Asian American Studies from UCLA and her J.D. from Golden Gate University. Proximity and love for Chinatown is a factor in many of her decisions.
James DiRito +
Good Medicine Logo; Forever, Chinatown (Graphic Design)
James DiRito has a multidisciplinary design background with over 15 years experience (Lions Gate Films, Olivia travel, DiningOut Magazine) all of which has helped shape his aesthetics and sense of design. James is the founder of Healioscope, a design boutique based in San Francisco specializing in brand, identity, web and print campaigns. Healiscope was the creator of the Good Medicine Logo.
Virginia Gee +
Chinatown Shorts; Forever, Chinatown (Location Manager)
Andres Torres-Vives +
Istinma/To Rest (Director, Co-Writer)
Andrés Torres-Vives was born in Chile, raised in New York, received his MFA in film directing at UCLA, and is currently a film professor at Arizona State University’s Herberger Institure for Arts and Design. Torres-Vives has been awarded a Fulbright Fellowship in Filmmaking, a prestigious Jacob Javits Fellowship, a Motion Picture Association of America Award in directing (MPAA), three scholarships from the National Hispanic Foundation for the Arts, a McNamara Foundation grant and the Jack Nicholson Distinguished Prize in Directing. His films have played at multiple film festivals, including the HBO/New York International Latino Film Festival, the Los Angeles Latino International Film Festival, the Morelia International Film Festival and broadcast on KCET-LA’s Fine Cut Series. Torres-Vives lives in Los Angeles, CA, and has worked extensively on immigrant, refugee, LGBT issues; as well as teaching video and photography to incarcerated minors.
Paul De Lumen +
Istinma/To Rest (Director of Photography)
Paul's feature ZONA SUR (Tokyo International, Sundance Directing Award World Cinema Dramatic 2010, Best Cinematography 35th Huelva Film Festival) was Bolivia's official entry to the 2010 Academy Awards for Best Foreign Language Film. Other features include MTV’s SAVAGE COUNTY, and soon to be released, Vuguru Studio's THE TEMP, and YVY MARAEY, a surreal road trip film based in the heart of South America. Clients include: Vuguru, Esquire Channel, WNET Thirteen, Reebok, National Geographic, Lucasfilm and Sony.
Kevin Killer +
Istinma/To Rest (Executive Producer)
Kevin is a youth activist, Native American politician, and president of the Oglala Sioux Tribe. He previously served as a Democratic member of the South Dakota House of Representatives from 2009 to 2017 and the South Dakota Senate from 2017 to 2019, representing the 27th district. He lives in Pine Ridge, South Dakota. In November 2020, he was elected tribal president of the Oglala Sioux Tribe.
Jesse Short Bull +
Istinma/To Rest (Co-Writer)
Jesse was born in Pine Ridge South Dakota and lives in the heart of the Badlands. He is a past fellow of the 2009 Institute of American Indian Arts ABC/Disney Writers Tract and the 2008 Fox Entertainment's Diversity Development Institute. He is a founding member of Native Youth Leadership Alliance and has worked with the Lakota Land Project researching historical and cultural sites within the Pine Ridge Reservation. He is the recipient of the 2014 First Peoples Fund's Artist in Business Leadership Fellow. When the weather is fair, he roams the prairies near his hometown of Interior looking for agates and rattlesnakes.
Marris Curran +
Istinma/To Rest (Assistant Director)
Maris Curran is a director and producer whose films have screened at Berlinale and MoMA and have been featured on The New York Times Op-Docs and the PBS series Independent Lens. Her debut narrative feature, Five Nights in Maine, premiered at the Toronto Film Festival starring David Oyelowo, Dianne Weist, and Rosie Perez. She holds an MFA from the School of the Art Institute in Chicago, has participated in the Whitney Independent Study Program, and is a former Fulbright fellow.
