The Winnipeg Film Group is pleased to announce the appointment of Leslie Supnet as the new Executive Director.
Leslie joins the Winnipeg Film Group at a significant moment for the organization, as it recommits to greater equity, access and material support for the community to create, and advocate for, artist-driven independent cinema in all of its expanded forms. Leslie is committed to meaningful community engagement to ensure the organization is mission driven, with a vision to be an inclusive centre for filmmaking practices in Manitoba. Leslie will work to establish and sustain anti-racism, diversity and inclusion as core values of the organization’s work and workplace by incorporating anti-oppression strategies in developing policies that are carried out with transparency and accountability.
Dave Barber, the Winnipeg Cinematheque’s senior programmer and longest tenured staff member, and his relentless advocacy for diverse filmmaking talent and cinema is an intentional guiding light for the organization. Leslie will support collaboration from the Board, staff, and the community to ensure that Dave Barber’s legacy, of kindness and community building, continues through the enrichment of cinema and arts culture in Winnipeg and beyond.
Leslie is a Filipinx moving image artist and educator, who has worked with artist-run centres for over 12 years. She has taught extensively in the community as a facilitator, mentor and academic instructor, with service on artist-run Boards in Winnipeg and Toronto. Leslie has programmed artist-driven screenings at the Winnipeg Cinematheque, Pacific Cinematheque, Pleasure Dome and Plastic Paper: Winnipeg’s Festival of Animated, Illustrated and Puppet Film. Leslie’s artistic practice spans various media – animation, analog film/video, expanded drawing and design, with works screened at TIFF, International Film Festival Rotterdam, Image Forum Festival in Japan, Flaherty NYC and Kurzfilmtage Oberhausen amongst many others. She holds an MFA in Film Production (experimental stream) from York University.
We are very pleased and excited to welcome an acclaimed, engaged and experienced member of our community to the organization. Throughout her career Leslie has truly demonstrated a commitment to the values and vision we wish to pursue.
Accompanying Leslie’s appointment as Executive Director, the Winnipeg Film Group also welcomes new Board members: filmmaker and veteran WFG Board member Ryan Simmons; writer, producer and former Cinematheque programmer Kier-La Janisse; Filipino-Canadian filmmaker, writer, performer and educator Fernando Dalayoan; Indigenous filmmaker and freelance industry professional Marc Greene; and writer/producer Fritzi Adelman. The Board is committed to fostering an inclusive, safe and inspirational environment reflective of and responsive to its diverse membership, and looks forward to supporting Leslie with accountability and transparency as she stewards the Winnipeg Film Group through the next chapter of its five-decade history.