We are IFWC!
Board of Directors
Adam Bentley
Bari Lavy
Edmon Rotea
Jeffery Nichols
Luis D. Ayala
Christina Beamish
IFWC Staff
Adam Bentley
Festival Director
Adam Bentley is a filmmaker, screenwriter, and the face of #yegfilm. His works explore traumatic experiences in spaces we once felt safe, including the body, the home, the land, and the nation. His works have screened across Canada, the United States, Europe, Air Canada, CBC Television, and online. He is a FAVA Producer member and founder of the International Festival of Winter Cinema. He's also the recipient of the Edmonton Arts Council's Cultural Diversity in the Arts Award, and two-time recipient of the Alberta Foundation for the Arts' Cultural Relations Award. When not working on the film festival, he can be found biking -summer or winter, in Edmonton’s river valley.
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Bar Lavy
Programmer
A former resident of four countries other than Canada, Bar Lavy has seen lots of images all over the world. Bar has nurtured a passion for film and photography since he was a young child glued to the TV screen. Now equipped with a B.A. in Film Studies from the University of Alberta, Bar is looking to share his eclectic vision with the rest of the world. He has worked on multiple short films, web series, music videos, photo shoots, TV pilots, and commercials.
Luis Ayala
Marketing
Looking forward to making film affordable for everyone who wants to tell stories, Luis is a filmmaker, video editor and scriptwriter with a big passion for narrative and making people smile with his stories either real or fictional. Finishing his studies in audiovisual production back in Mexico, he’s here now in Edmonton, being part of IFWC and the film community, excited to know what fresh stories he could tell.
Christina Beamish
Operations
Christina Beamish is an Edmonton-based screenwriter, filmmaker, and director. She writes and directs narrative film work with a focus on telling human stories from an 2SLGBTQIA+ lens. Christina was awarded a Telus Storyhive grant and two AMPIA nominations for her short-narrative directorial debut, ‘Sunday Morning Coming Down’.
Kevin Heaman
Development
Kevin Heaman is a Canadian Artist and Arts Manager who looks at both creative processes and developing emerging artists in a technological world. He has recently received his MA in Arts, Festival, and Cultural Management at Queen Margaret University, where he specialized in Music Management and Digital Storytelling. In his artist practice, he experiments with various art mediums, from live performance art to digital storytelling, and blends them together into his artistic work. In his professional work, he currently consults with various arts organizations, including music, film, and theatre groups, working in a variety of roles from grant writing and artist management to producing music videos.
Damian Lachacz
Volunteer and Outreach Coordinator
Damian has volunteered with IFWC since 2021. He is currently studying English and Film Studies at the University of Alberta. In his free time, he watches niche movies/tv shows, plays board games with friends and reads gritty mystery novels.