Albert Birney

When We Become Wind (2026) - Runtime 13:30 (excerpt of a feature film)
Tux and Fanny sail the ocean looking for a new home.

Albert Birney is a Baltimore based filmmaker. He has directed six feature films, The Beast Pageant (co-directed with Jon Moses), Sylvio and Strawberry Mansion (both co-directed with Kentucker Audley), Tux and Fanny, Eyeballs in the Darkness and OBEX. Sylvio was named one of the ten-best films of 2017 by The New Yorker. His films have premiered at Sundance, SXSW, the Maryland Film Festival, Slamdance and the Ottawa International Animation Festival. In 2021 he released a Tux and Fanny video game that he made with Gabriel Koenig.

Amy Oden

Weirdo (2025) - Runtime: 5:02
In the summer before her freshman year, Bronwyn tells us what it's like to grow up in two very different places.

Lucie and Annie (2023) - Runtime: 5:39
Lucie and Annie discuss their struggle to become married, and encourage others to fight for LGBTQ+ rights.

The World According to Pussy Noir: Intro (2023) - Runtime 1:02 (excerpt)
Intro to a short documentary: The World According to Pussy Noir. Follow Pussy Noir’s historic fellowship at the Kennedy Center where she has sought to elevate drag onto one of the biggest stages in the region. As Pussy Noir blends history, queerness, and couture into a queer fashion show, can she make her ideas sing on the catwalk?

Lipstick and Leather: Trailer (2020) - Runtime 0:45 (excerpt)
Trailer for a short documentary: Lipstick and Leather. In a buttoned-up city like DC, what happens when drag queens go rogue? Lipstick and Leather explores the “alt-drag” community in the nation’s capital, and how these performers are spreading their influence across the east coast."

Amy Oden is an Emmy Award–winning producer and director known for her person-first documentary and multimedia storytelling. She leads the video team at the AFL-CIO and previously served as Senior Director of Video at the Human Rights Campaign, where her film Daniel Really Suits You and the Trans Stories Are Everyone’s Stories campaign earned the 2025 TribecaX Social Impact Award, screened at Sundance BrandStorytelling, and received a Vimeo Staff Pick.

Amy’s independent work has been supported by the Jonathan Logan Family Foundation, distributed nationally on PBS, and recognized by the International Documentary Association and the Saul Zaentz Innovation Fund at Johns Hopkins. A former senior producer at Maryland Public Television, her work has earned three Emmy Awards and numerous honors including Communicator, Davey, Tribeca, and W3 Awards.

Be Steadwell

Runtime 12:54 (excerpts from films below)

Vow of Silence (2015)
A heartbroken musician takes a vow of silence after a breakup. In her struggle to reconnect with her ex, she meets an outgoing musician.

Black Tea (2025)
An artist and a collector argue over an antique teacup. They make their cases over a cup of tea and a crush develops."

Writer, Editor, Director: Be Steadwell, Starring Marie Tatti Aqeel, Jonquille Rice, AJ Head and Christen Taylor, featuring art by Megan Lewis, music by Be Steadwell and IAHIAL

Be Steadwell (They/Them, Be) is a filmmaker, composer and author based in Baltimore. Be's goal as an artist is to write love stories centering Black girlies, queer folks, introverts and weirdos.

Be earned a BA in Black Studies from Oberlin College and an MFA in film from Howard University. In 2019, Be wrote and directed Dear Ex, the musical. Dear Ex imagines a queer black woman's experience of healing after a breakup. In 2021 Be released their pop and R&B album- Succulent. In 2023, Be joined the cast of Parable of the Sower the Opera by Toshi Reagon and Dr Bernice Johnson Reagon.

Be released their debut romance novel Chocolate Chip City in 2025. Be currently lives in Baltimore. They tour their music and work as an adjunct lecturer at Howard University.

Lendl Tellington

The Age of All Women: The Becoming of Younousse Seye

Co-director: Merve Fejzula

Lendl Tellington is an artist who tinkers with time like music—remixing the line between prescribed histories and collective memory. Working across cinema, photography, and installation, his work illuminates the ingenious ways communities forge their own systems of value beyond institutional recognition. He transforms traditional power dynamics by creating intimate spaces where subjects become collaborators in shaping their own representation.

Recognized by the Smithsonian and supported by Sundance, Firelight Media, Bay Area Video Coalition, his practice refuses to separate fiction from non-fiction, deploying each to expose what the other conceals. Through collaborative processes that honor both subject and community, Tellington demonstrates that preservation itself is resistance—inspiring communities to claim narrative ownership when other forms remain elusive.

 

Lynn Tomlinson

A Black Rail's Tale (2026) - Runtime 5:00
Writer/Narrator: J. Drew Lanham, Music: Yasmin Williams, Co-producer: Craig Saper.

Mountain Nocturne (2026) - Runtime 6:30
Rectangular edit of a hemispheric fulldome film

Music: Slippy Bunuel, Co-Producer: Craig Saper

Lynn Tomlinson is an animator and media artist known for her unique clay-on-glass animation process, manipulating thin layers of oil-based modeling clay frame by frame to create painterly images under the camera in a stop-motion workflow. This handcrafted approach allows her to create shifting perspectives and on-screen transformations. Her films explore environmental and historical stories, often imagining how non-human beings might view humanity’s impact. She treats animation as an exploratory process and she’s especially interested in animation that spills beyond the frame, borrowing from painting, installation, and site-based practices. Her films have screened widely at festivals and in immersive settings. Tomlinson is a Professor at Towson University, where she encourages students to experiment, take risks, and pay close attention to the world around them.

 

Alex & Olmstead

Marianne’s Onion (2021) Runtime 7:00

Produced by Heather Henson's Handmade Puppet Dreams, “Marianne’s Onion” is a true story from the pandemic in which 86 year-old Marianne Ross, in need of an onion, unexpectedly finds one in the woods and is left to contemplate the nature of miracles. Featuring the voice of Marianne Ross. *Received Best Animation or Animated Sequence Madrid International Film Festival (2021)

Music:
Nights of Gladness Waltz by Charles William Ancliffe (1911-1920)
Fancy Little Nancy by William Baines (1919)
Flow Gently Sweet Afton by Jonathan E. Spilman (1921)
Bonnie, Sweet Bessie by James L. Gilbert (1921)

Screening History 
USA: Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival (2022)
USA: Maryland Film Festival (2022)
USA: Washington West International Film Festival (2021)
FRANCE: Paris Film Art Festival (2021)
CANADA: Montréal International Animation Festival - ANIMAZE (2021)
SPAIN: Madrid International Film Festival (2021)

Alex and Olmsted, winner of 4 Jim Henson Foundation grants, is an internationally acclaimed puppet theater and filmmaking company based in Baltimore, Maryland.