Fellowships
Guggenheim Fellow
USA Rockefeller Fellow
NYU Center on Law & Security
Sundance Institute Lab Fellow
Media Arts Fellow, Tribeca Film Institute
Awards
Academy Award nominee
Peabody Award
Gotham Award
Independent Spirit Award nominee
Sundance Cinematography Award
Cinema Eye Directing Award
True/False True Vision Award
Laura Poitras
Laura Poitras is working on a trilogy of films about America post 9/11. The first film, MY COUNTRY, MY COUNTRY (2006), was nominated for an Academy Award, Independent Spirit Award, and Emmy Award. The second film, THE OATH (2010), received a Gotham Award for Best Documentary, the Cinematography Award at Sundance, the Directing Award at Cinema Eye Honors, and Best Documentary Award at the Edinburgh Film Festival. She is currently working on the third part of the trilogy.
The trilogy has been selected for the 2012 Whitney Biennial.
Her video installation, O’SAY CAN YOU SEE (2001/2011), had its New York premiere at the Ronald Feldman Gallery in February 2011.
Poitras received a Peabody Award, Independent Spirit Award nomination, and Best Documentary award at SXSW for FLAG WARS (2003), a film made with Linda Goode Bryant. She is a producer on Ra’anan Alexandrovicz’ THE LAW IN THESE PARTS (2011), winner of the Documentary Award at the Jerusalem International Film Festival.
Her work has been shown at the Sundance Film Festival, Berlin Film Festival, IDFA, SXSW, Edinburgh Film Festival, and New Directors/New Films at MoMA and the Film Society of Lincoln Center. Her documentaries have been supported by ITVS, are distributed theatrically by Zeitgeist Films, and broadcast nationally on PBS/POV. She has attended the Sundance Institute Lab as both a fellow and creative advisor. She has taught documentary filmmaking at Yale University, and is currently a visiting artist at the Center for Documentary Studies at Duke University. Before making films she worked as a professional chef.