This year, a jury composed of Black, Indigenous and other people of color creatives, activist, and personalities who work in cinema, culture, nonprofits and advocacy organizations committed to environmental justice and conservation work selected films to win in the following categories: Hearwired Award, Next Generation Award, Best Feature Film, Best Animated Short Film and Best Non-Animated Short Film. Each award winner received a $600 prize.
“It’s an honor to have had more than 1,000 Black, Indigenous, Latino and other people of color submit their films to the first-ever Our Heritage, Our Planet Film Week,” said Maite Arce, president and CEO of Hispanic Access Foundation. “With so many amazingly produced films, it was truly a difficult decision to select only a few films for these awards.
We hope through our film festival, we helped elevate their stories, culture and heritage, but we also started a dialogue between communities and decision-makers around the importance of engaging in climate action and policy during the events.”
Below is the complete list of award winners and honorable mentions for the inaugural Our Heritage, Our Planet Film Week:
Next Generation Award
- Winner - I Know What Pandemic Means (USA - Frisly Soberanis)
- Honorable Mention - Señora Océano (USA - Omar de Leon)
- Honorable Mention - When We Finally Understood (Spain - 11 and 12 year olds)
Heartwired Award
- Winner - On the Surface (Iceland - Fan Sissoko)
- Honorable Mention - The Seashell (Iran - Ali Kargar)
Best Feature Award
- Winner - However Wide the Sky: Places of Power (USA - David Aubrey)
Best Non-Animated Short Award
- Winner - Ava Kuña, Aty Kuña: indigenous woman, political woman (Brazil - Julia Zulian, Fabiane Medina, Guilherme Sai)
- Honorable Mention - Futur (France - Alexandre Laugier)
Best Animated Short Award
- Winner - The Birth (India - Arjun Mukherjee)
- Honorable Mention - Lonely Whale (USA - Steve Nguyen)
- Honorable Mention - The Leaf (Canada - Leonardo Queiroz de Sá)
Please reach out to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. with any questions or visit https://ourheritageourplanet.org/ to learn more about the filmweek.