Founder
Lucie Chabrol-Nyssens
Lucie was born in Republic Democratic of Congo, and spent her formative years in Brussels, Belgium. She moved to New York City in November 1980 where she has been an interior designer for 40 years, with 30 of these years in private practice. She studied interior design in Brussels, in addition to art history and painting in Florence, Italy. Though she lives in New York, she travels extensively throughout Europe on a consistent basis – and to other parts of the world as often as she can.
Her interest in cinematography and short films began 15 years ago, once she realized the lack of representation of Francophone films in the United States. With her artistic background, the entry into this genre was a natural progression.
Lucie is a native French speaker, and is fluent in English and Italian.
Team
Pascale Crépon
Pascale was born in Lausanne, Switzerland. She got a diploma from the Burier business school and a master in English, Philosophy, and Art History from the Lausanne University. She moved to Minneapolis and did a Ph.D. in French and Theatre at the University of Minnesota. Pascale has then moved to New York City and is now a lecturer in the department of French at Columbia University where she teaches French and Theatre. She also organized theatre workshops for all students of Columbia and Barnard who want to experience French differently. In 2011 Pascale organized a francophone film festival at Columbia. Her desire was to show more francophone films on campus and allow students to discover other aspects of the French language and culture. That is when she met Lucie Chabrol who helped finding Belgian films for the festival. Both Pascale and Lucie have a “non-French” understanding of “francophonie” and want to actively promote francophone cinema in New York, and that is how their friendship was born! It has been a pleasure to be part of the Francophone short films festival adventure for many years, from finding short films, meeting people who also want to promote francophone projects of all kinds, to asking for financial support, and advertising the festival. But above all, it has been a real fun to work with Lucie who is a kind, interesting, and passionate woman with sparkling blue eyes!
Jean-françois Ravagnan
Born in 1983 in Liège, Belgium, Jean-François Ravagnan was trained at the Institut des Arts de Diffusion in Louvain-la-Neuve in Belgium. Alternating between fiction and documentary exercises, he follows the teaching of Belgian directors Frédéric Fonteyne, Bénédicte Liénard, Benoît Mariage and Frédéric Dumont.
Since 2007, he has worked as first and second assistant director on a dozen films, notably Le Silence by Lorna and Le Gamin au Vélo by Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne.
Along with his film career, he regularly collaborates with the theater as a video creator. On the occasion of shows in Europe and Latin America, he produced the video creations for Fabrice Murgia's shows produced by Le Théâtre National de Belgique and La Compagnie Artara.
In 2015, he directed his first short fiction film entitled Renaître. Shot between Brussels and Tunis, the film was selected at the 68th Locarno Film Festival and awarded at several international festivals.
Today, Jean-François Ravagnan is more particularly devoted to the development of his next fiction and documentary projects.
Bukary Sawadogo
Dr. Boukary Sawadogo is professor of cinema studies in the Department of Media and Communication Arts at the City College of New York - City University of New York.
Dr. Sawadogo is the author of numerous publications on African cinema, including three books, book chapters, articles, and film reviews. His monographs are: Les cinemas francophones ouest africains, 1990-2005 (Harmattan, 2013), African Film Studies: An Introduction (Routledge, 2018), and West African Screen Media: Comedy, TV Series, and Transnationalization (Michigan State University Press, 2019).
In addition, he has made a documentary film Salut Y’all: African Teachers on the Bayou (2013) which was selected by festivals in the USA and Africa. He is also the producer and director of the YouTube web-series, Aventure africaine à New York, on the experience of francophone African immigrants in New York City.
Joseph Pomp
Joseph Pomp is a film scholar and critic who has contributed to The Baffler, BOMB, The Brooklyn Rail, Senses of Cinema, and other publications. He received his PhD in Comparative Literature with a secondary field in Critical Media Practice, and works as an editor at Harvard University Press.
Alyssia Schelfaut
Web Designer
Nadine Keseman
Nadine Keseman is a film editor and director. She’s also been an editing teacher at “Institut des Arts de Diffusion", Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium for 20 years. Finally, Nadine was also in charge of the movie selection at Plan K, an independent movie theater in Brussels, Belgium.
Mamadou Dia
Mamadou is a Senegalese director based in New York. He completed a Master in Filmmaking at the Tisch School of the Arts (NYU). Before moving to the US he worked as a videojournalist and camera operator in Senegal for more than eight years. His short film, Contained, is based on true events that happened in Sierra Leone when he was covering the Ebola outbreak in 2014. His short film Samedi Cinema (2016) premiered at the Venice and Toronto International Film Festivals, and won the CH Cinema Network Prize at the Fribourg International Film Festival in 2017. His debut feature film, Nafi's Father (2019), won the Golden Leopard in the Filmmakers of the Present competition and the First Feature award at Locarno International Film Festival.
Julie Deffet
Award winning Producer and Director, Julie was born in a French-speaking town in southern Belgium.
After graduating from ULB (Université Libre de Bruxelles) with a Master’s degree in Journalism, she moved to New York to study filmmaking at The New School for public engagement.
Her personal work has screened at Cinequest, The Big Apple Film Festival, The Prague International Film Festival and the Bowery Film Festival among other places. She has won several awards both as a Director and Producer, including Best Picture at the Los Angeles Film Awards.
Julie was recently an Associate Producer on the movie The Drummer starring Danny Glover and the Emmy Award winning show After Forever. Julie has also worked as a freelance editor for companies such as Sony, Google and Vice Media. She is an adjunct professor at New York Film Academy and lives in Brooklyn, New York.