Bio: Bryan Mark Urbsaitis received degrees from City University of New York - Hunter College (M.F.A. - Nonfiction Documentary Filmmaking 2016), New York University (Ph.D. International Education 2007, M.A. Speech & Interpersonal Communication 2001) and Boston University (B.S. Mass Communication Studies 1994), and has taught communication at several colleges and universities. A freelance videographer, researcher, and activist with an eye and ear for social justice issues, he is quadrilingual and both a cyclist and founder of AIDS Ride South Africa. Find him at arsa.org.za.

Artist Statement: Wood drinks water to grow, fire destroys wood to fan its flames, earth covers fire to extinguish it, and water turns earth into mud. Messages and I are like water…ubiquitous. We pour into everything, can be healing and destroying, calming and agitating, nurturing and flooding, kind and cruel. We are everywhere like the ocean, uncontrollable like a waterfall, explosive like a geyser, and mysterious like fog or steam. My filmmaking and research are all very much informed by my cross-cultural experiences. The world has for years been my cross-cultural classroom. I have traveled to over 75 countries and have had the chance to do filmmaking and other media advocacy development projects in several of them: human rights education in Brazil, ethnographic research methodology in Mexico, reconciliation and peace-building in South Africa, HIV & AIDS throughout Africa, and filmmaking in Cuba, just to name a few. Each trip contributes to helping me hone my artistic vision and activism in some way, and I aspire to create social change through positive examples of personal and public empowerment.

Areas of Interest: documentary filmmaking, media advocacy, sustainable development, social justice journalism, social movements, intercultural communication, international education, technology, global south, EU, LGBT, HIV & AIDS.

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