Jury
Rebecca Martin (USA)
Rebecca Martin has spearheaded pivotal programs at National Geographic and oversaw high-profile explorers—including Sylvia Earle, Robert Ballard, and Mike Fay—among many others. She also developed and directed the organization’s first storytelling grant program which supported high profile exploration and conservation-based projects. In addition, Rebecca created and led the Young Explorers Program at National Geographic to provide grants to young explorers for fieldwork in science, conservation and storytelling. Rebecca serves on the Board of Directors of Machik and Telluride Mountainfilm, and on the advisory board of New York WILD Film Festival. She has served on the juries of Mountainfilm in Telluride and the Banff Mountain Festivals, as well as the Trento, Autrans, and Bilbao Mendi mountain film festivals. Rebecca resides in Washington, D.C. on the edge of Rock Creek Park and the National Zoo, where coyotes howl after dusk and lions roar in the pre-dawn. She is widely recognized as a leader in empowering explorers around the world, and now runs a speakers bureau and consultancy through Exploration Connections.
Christoph Grill (Austria)
Christoph Grill is a climber, photographer and archaeozoologist, which lives and works in Graz. During his artistic education scholarships guided him to Jerusalem, Paris and Wladiwostok. For years Christoph Grill deals with the situation of former communistic states in the east and west of Europe in his work, as well as with the successor states of the former Soviet Union. His artwork was presented in numerous national and international exhibitions and are represented in some Austrian art collections. His climbing adventures go hand in hand with his scientific work.
Wilma Pradetto (Austria)
Wilma Pradetto is born in Graz, studied at the German Cinematic and Television Academy in Berlin and then successfully completed a FFA-Director-Scholarship at Martin Scorsese and Michael Ballhaus. Afterwards she assisted in and created motion picture productions of Helma Sanders-Brahms, István Szabó and Peter Patzak. Since 1992 she works as a documentary film director and amongst others implemented the documentary film “Beruf Lehrer”, which is nominated for the Grimme-Prize. In the last years she directed numerous episodes of the ARTE-Series “Zu Tisch” in Austria. Wilma Pradetto has been member of the jury of Peace-Film-Prize for many years, which is an inherent part of the Berlinale. Her passion is to plunge into new worlds. Exploratory spirit and the joy of creativity are keeping her going. Anyway every topic excites Wilma Pradetto: one only has to get into it, must ask, explore, listen and look closely.
