This month, Proverb honors filmmaker Ava DuVernay, who recently became the first black woman to win a best director award at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival for her feature film Middle of Nowhere.
Los Angeles native and UCLA graduate, Ava DuVernay appeared on the film scene with her critically acclaimed 2008 hip-hop documentary, This is The Life, which debuted on Showtime in April 2009. In 2010 she directed and produced My Mic Sounds Nice, a film documenting the history of female hip-hop artists, airing as BET Network’s first original music documentary.
Two other network music documentaries directed and produced by DuVernay include Essence Music Festival 2010, a two hour concert film chronicling the nation’s largest annual African-American entertainment gathering, and Faith Through the Storm, a documentary about women in New Orleans who have reclaimed their lives after personal devastation during Hurricane Katrina.
Prior to her groundbreaking career as a filmmaker, DuVernay founded DVA Media and Marketing in 1999, an award-winning firm providing strategy and execution for more than 120 film and television campaigns. She also founded AFFRM, the African-American Film Festival Releasing Movement, an initiative to distribute and gain a wider screening for independent black films.
DuVernay’s most recent achievement as the winner of the US Directing Award represents a shift in African-American filmmaking. Her feature, Middle of Nowhere, received glowing reviews from both critics and audience after its Sundance premier in January. This compelling drama tells the story of a woman’s separation from her incarcerated husband and the journey to reconcile her marriage with her identity.
