“Natasha Mayers: an Un-Still Life” Making Impact Around the Globe

May 24, 2021

MAINE, USA: The 2021-released Maine Masters documentary short film Natasha Mayers: an Un-Still Life reached new audiences across the globe this month. After winning the Vermont PBS Award for Best Documentary at the 2021 Made Here Film Festival, filmmakers Anita Clearfield and Geoffrey Leighton launched a suite of education curricula available to educators across the globe and are planning a series of community events in 2021 to screen the film and inspire activism.

MADE HERE FILM FESTIVAL WINNER: The 2021 Made Here Film Festival, New England’s only competitive festival devoted entirely to films made by filmmakers of the Northern New England states and Québec, aired virtually May 5-9. Vermont PBS hosted a virtual interview with Clearfield and Leighton on May 16. The film will also be screened at the Vermont International Film Festival, running in-person October 8-17 in Burlington, Vermont.

ARTS EDUCATION CURRICULA LAUNCHED: Maine educators Argy Nestor, Kal Elmore, and Catherine Ring created resources for art educators to utilize the film in lessons for students in grades K-12. Arts curricula, based around the powerful story of Natasha’s art activism, expression of social and political ideas through art, and using art to propel change, are available at natashamayers.org/education. Early this month Nestor introduced the resources to collaborators from the Sweet Tree Arts Fellowship Program, extending the film’s reach as far as Kenya.

COMMUNITY EVENTS IN THE WORKS: The filmmakers and Ms. Mayers invite community groups to use the film as a tool to influence and energize their stakeholders around issues that are important to them. They have developed a Community Discussion Guide which can be used to organize special screening events, with options to facilitate a discussion of the film, display ARRT! banners, and design an “art-build” related to their cause.

For more information about the film’s increasing impact, contact info@natashamayers.org.