Mattijs van de Port is a visual anthropologist at the University of Amsterdam. He did research in Serbia, Portugal and the Netherlands, and since 2001 in Bahia, Brazil. In all of his work he keeps returning to realms of transgression – ecstatic religion, violence, trauma, eroticism and aesthetics – where humans face the fact that the world does not necessarily comply with their narrations of it. 

Van de Port is founder of the Media Lab at the University of Amsterdam, and member of the research collective CameraWise.

He is the author of three monographs (Gypsies, Wars and Other Instances of the Wild,1998); Geliquideerd, 2001; Ecstatic Encounters, 2011) and published widely in top journals such as American Ethnologist, Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, Visual Anthropology Review, Material Religion, Religião e Sociedade, etc.

His essay films are all shot in Bahia, Brazil and have been selected for all the major ethnographic film festivals. They include SaborearFrutasBrasileiras (2013); The Possibility of Spirits (2016, winner of the Samodiva Award for "Best Film of the International Film Festival of Ethnographic Films" in Sofia, Bulgaria ); Knots and Holes (2018, honorary mention in the main competition of the Ethnocineca Film Festival, in Vienne, Austria); The Body Won’t Close (2021, winner of the Basil Wright Film Prize at the RAI Filmfestival in Bristol, UK and Excellence in Visual Anthropology Award at the Ethnocineca Film Festival in Vienna, Austria ); and his latest film Where Can I Get Lost? (2024).

Elizabeta Koneska, an ethnologist, born and living in Skopje, works at the National Museum of North Macedonia. She graduated in ethnology from the University of Belgrade, and later continued her postgraduate studies at Mimar Sinan University in Istanbul. Since 1993, she has been working in visual ethnography and has made about 15 films. Her films have been presented at international festivals, summer schools, workshops around the world and have won several awards, including the Grand Prix at the 16th International Ethnological Film Festival in Belgrade; the Honorary Yilmaz Güney Award at the Istanbul Culture, Arts and Short Film Festival; the AcoAleksov Award at the 9th International Short Film Festival Aster Fest in Strumica; Special Award at the 6th International Heritage Film Festival, American Cultural Center in Sofia; and the Grand Prix Audience Award at the International Tourism and Ethnographic Film Festival, in Krk, Croatia. She has been a member of the jury at film festivals in Serbia and Iran on several occasions.

Emilija Gašić is an award-winning filmmaker and cinematographer. She earned her MFA in Cinematography from NYU Tisch School of the Arts and holds a BFA in Film Directing from the Academy of Arts in Belgrade.

Her debut feature film, 78 Days, supported by Film Center Serbia and AVCRS, world-premiered in the Bright Future section at the International Film Festival Rotterdam, where it ranked among the festival’s twenty most-watched films. The film has since won numerous awards, including the Best Film Prize at Cyprus Film Days, Tofifest, and the Innsbruck International Film Festival. Gašić was recently honored with the Vanguard Award at the Vancouver International Film Festival and the Discovery Prize at the Seoul International Women’s Film Festival.

As a cinematographer, she has shot films across the USA, France, Norway, and the Czech Republic. She is a Nikon Storytellers Award recipient and a finalist for the Volker Bahnemann Award for Outstanding Cinematography. Her cinematography recent work, Waltz for Three screened at Dances with films in LA. She splits her time between New York City and Belgrade.