TORONTO—Kaitlynn Tomaselli, a Sheshegwaning First Nation member, is the program manager for the imagineNATIVE festival in Toronto.
“The festival provides a platform for Indigenous artistic resources, perspectives and cultures to be at the forefront,” Ms. Tomaselli told The Expositor. The imagineNATIVE festival is one, if not the largest, Indigenous festivals showcasing film, video, audio, digital and interactive media made by Indigenous screen-content creators.
This year’s festival features the work of creators from 71 First Nations, “From all over the world,” said Ms. Tomaselli.
Ms. Tomaselli was hired by imagineNATIVE Film + Media Arts Festival four years ago. “I’ve been here since 2019. I’ve always been in the arts and theatre field. I worked for Debajehmujig Theatre Group as a summer intern when I was in high school. And I went to school for acting.”
“This year’s festival will be the 24th edition of the annual event,” said Ms. Tomaselli. “When the festival was founded, at that time it provided films about Indigenous people produced by non-Indigenous people,” said Ms. Tomaselli. “Now the films about indigenous people are being made by Indigenous people. It is awesome.”
“This is a large festival and important to Indigenous film creators and viewers around the world,” said Ms. Tomaselli.
Ms. Tomaselli pointed out she had originally been hired to work as a digital interactive assistant for the festival. Since 2021 she has taken on the duties as program manager of the festival, overseeing all artistic programming which includes film, audio, and digital interactive programming for imagineNATIVE’s year-round and festival initiatives.
“The festival will be staged in person from October 17-22, with the online programming taking place October 23-29,” said Ms. Tomaselli. “There is a total of 14 feature films and 70 short films, along with 21 digital interactive works and 17 audio works to be shown during the festival.”
The festival continued to be held on an annual basis through the pandemic, said Ms. Tomaselli. “In 2020 and 2021 we provided online programming, kind of like the Netflix initiative and at drive-ins within the city of Toronto. And through a partnership with Cineplex, we were able to show films in Toronto, Vancouver and Sudbury.”
“Last year was the first year we have been in person for the festival,” said Ms. Tomaselli. “It was really great to get back to in person.”
