INEKE SMITS

After graduating as a photographer and video artist, Ineke studied film directing and script writing at the National Film and Television School in England where she obtained her Master’s in 1994. In 2001 her first award-winning feature Magonia premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival and traveled the world after. A year later she won a Nipkow Fellowship in Berlin to work on her second feature The Aviatrix of Kazbek, which closed the 2010 edition of the International Film Festival Rotterdam. Between 1998 and 2019 Ineke wrote and directed seven successful documentaries, amongst them Putin’s Mama, Transit Dubai and Little Man, Time and the Troubadour. All were presented at the International Documentary Festival Amsterdam and other international festivals. Ineke is a coach and lecturer and advises various funds and organizations. She lives and works in the Netherlands and in Georgia where she is a development producer for Tbilisi-based film production company Nushi Films.

IEVA ŪBELE

Ieva Ūbele has an extensive portfolio encompassing production of documentary films with focus on social and environmental issues. Since 2019 she runs her production company, Baltic Balkan Productions, dedicated to producing and co-producing films emphasizing powerful personal narratives and social issues. From 2020 to 2023, she served as the Head of Industry Programme at Beldocs IDFF in Serbia. Since January 2024, she has taken on the role of Forum Producer at the Baltic Sea Docs in Riga, Latvia. In addition to her roles in production and industry event management, Ieva also serves as an expert and tutor in the field, acting as a tutor and matchmaker at documentary film training events, including Agora Lab at the Thessaloniki International Documentary Film Festival, BDC Discoveries, and ESoDoc.