V.T. Nayani
V.T. Nayani is a multidisciplinary artist and storyteller, who weaves between directing, writing, and performing. Her storytelling explores how we repeatedly come of age.
She is an alumni of Film Independent's Episodic Lab ('24), The Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television's Directors Program for Women (‘22), The Canadian Film Centre's Directors' Lab (‘21), as well as BIPOC TV & Film's Showrunner Bootcamp ('22) and Directors’ Masterclass (‘23). Nayani is also an alumni of CBC's Workshop for Diverse Creators, HotDocs’ Doc Accelerator Program, Reelworld Film Festival's Emerging 20 Program, and BlackStar Film Festival's William & Louise Greaves Filmmaker Seminar. As an artist, she has been championed by local and global platforms including Telefilm Canada, The Gotham, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Netflix, L’Oréal Paris, Canada Council for the Arts, Ontario Arts Council, Toronto Arts Council, AWID, Women Deliver, and Women of the World. She is also a recipient of the UN Women Yvonne M. Hebert Award for media makers.
In addition to her artistic practice, Nayani remains committed to supporting her creative community. In 2021, she was invited to be a Commissioning Editor for Toronto Reel Asian International Film Festival's 25th anniversary anthology (re)Rites of Passage: Asian Canada in Motion. She has also served as a workshop programmer and facilitator, mentor artist, and juror for various festivals and arts institutions. Most recently, she served on feature and short film juries for the Toronto International Film Festival ('23), Vancouver Queer Film Festival ('23), and Inside Out Toronto 2SLGBTQ+ Film Festival ('24).
V.T’s award-winning feature directorial debut, THIS PLACE, co-written with Devery Jacobs and Golshan Abdmoulaie, had its World Premiere at the 47th Toronto International Film Festival. It has since screened at numerous festivals across the world, and is now available digitally in Canada, the UK, the US, and the Caribbean.
