Annette Mangaard has written, and directed fifteen films in more than a decade as an independent filmmaker. She has recently been nominated for a Gemini for Best Director of a Documentary for her one hour documentary, GENERAL IDEA: ART, AIDS, AND THE FIN DE SIECLE (for TVO, Bravo, SCN, Knowledge) about the celebrated Canadian artists collective which premiered at Hot Doc’s in Toronto then went on to garner accolades at the Vancouver International Festival, DOCSDF Mexican Documentary Film Festival and Asolo International Art Film Festival in Italy (among others). Mangaard was recently lauded with a retrospective of her art films at the Cinemateque Palais de Kino in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Having just completed a feature length documentary about the changing face of the Inuit artists of Cape Dorset for Bravo, TVO and APTN, Mangaard is returning to her roots in theatrical drama.
Mangaard has several feature length screenplays in development including LARSOPIA with Zentropa (Lars von Trier’s company) in Denmark. She is currently working on a feature length screenplay, ALBERTA BEAUTY, a road movie about two women traveling through Alberta to blow up the tar sands.

Mangaard’s series directing includes 4 episodes of Heart of A Poet produced by Makin’ Movies for BRAVO. Other recent films include INTO THE NIGHT, a film noir of the night produced by the National Film Board of Canada, as well as THE MANY FACES OF ARNAUD MAGGS, a one hour documentary on the celebrated Canadian artist/photographer Arnaud Maggs for TVOntario.

FISH TALE SOUP (1997) starring Remy Girard marked her debut as a feature film writer and director. FISH TALE SOUP screened theatrically at the Carlton Cinemas in Toronto and in a number of other theatres across Canada. The 1998 City TV premiere garnered much critical praise.

It all started for Mangaard in 1981 when she bought a super 8 camera and moved to Baker Lake, a small community in the Canadian Arctic. After a year of hunting, fishing and eating caribou with the Inuit, she returned with the five rolls of film which eventually became one of her trademark innovative narratives, LET ME WRAP MY ARMS AROUND YOU.

Born in Lille Vaerlose, Denmark, Mangaard emigrated to Canada, as a child, with her family. Mangaard’s richly imaged film style is anchored in her studies between 1976-80 at the Ontario College of Art where she earned an honours degree in painting and printmaking.

Her short film titles include: LET ME WRAP MY ARMS AROUND YOU, 94 ARCANA DRIVE, NORTHBOUND CAIRO, THE ICONOGRAPHY OF VENUS, THE TYRANNY OF ACHITECTURE and A DIALOGUE WITH VISION: THE ART OF SPRING HURLBUT AND JUDITH SCHWARZ. These works have screened at festivals around the world including: The Experimental Film Coalition in Chicago, The Collective for Living Cinema in New York, the SESC de Pompeia in Sao Poalo, Brazil, Ozfun Australian Tour, and The Ann Arbour Film Festival. National screenings include the International Festival of Festivals, Toronto, The Vancouver Film Festival, Mexico City DOCSDF International Documentary Festival, Asoloa Arts Film Festival, Italy, the National Gallery in
Ottawa and a host of solo shows.

Mangaard’s films have screened extensively on Canadian television. The MANY FACES OF SOUP aired on CITY TV, Radio Canada and the Woman’s Television Network. LET ME WRAP, NORTHBOUND CAIRO, and A DIALOGUE WITH VISION have all been broadcast by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation and a number of other networks. Most of Mangaard’s short films have been screened by SHOWCASE – CITY TV, BRAVO, TVO, The WOMEN’S TELEVISION NETWORK as well as Knowledge and Access Networks and VISION TV.

In 1990 Mangaard was invited to present solo screenings of her films at the Pacific Cinemateque in Vancouver, Canada and in 1991 at the Kino Arsenal Cinemateque in Berlin, West Germany.

Mangaard was invited to attend the Canadian Film Centre in 1992, as a writer/director resident, where she directed the short film 94 ARCANA DRIVE.

Annette Mangaard’s activities also include positions as; Associate Awards Officer and Associate Visual and Media Arts Officer at the Ontario Arts Council from 2000- 2008, programmer for TVOntario’s “Exposures: The Art of Film and Video” for 2003-05,Co Founder and Executive Director of “IMAGES: Festival of Independent Film and Video” from 1988-90, as well as serving on Boards of Directors for various arts organizations including: The Toronto Arts Council, The Liaison of Independent Filmmakers of Toronto, The Funnel, Visual Arts Ontario and
the Canadian Filmmakers Distribution Centre. Mangaard is the recipient of numerous Arts Awards including: Toronto Arts Council (2004), FUND (93), The Canada Council (92, 99, 2004), The Ontario Arts Council (91, 98), Canadian Non-Theatrical Fund (89), Toronto Arts Council (2004).

Eva Ligeti, Vice Chair

Eva Ligeti is the Executive Director of the Clean Air Partnership <www.cleanairpartnership.org> and co-chair of the GTA Clean Air Council. Ms. Ligeti’s goal is to build programs, policies and practices that facilitate sustainable urban environments. She develops market and community-based research and strategies for: healthy, clean air; climate adapted, resilient cities; a sustainable built environment that reflects livable, sustainable urban planning, with convenient, accessible, public transit and active forms of transportation. Ms. Ligeti serves on numerous boards and committees including, Federation of Canadian Municipalities’ Green Municipal Fund’s Council, Brantford Power Inc. and the Advisory Council of the Nuclear Waste Management Organization. She is a member of the Province of Ontario’s Expert Panel on Climate Change Adaptation and a co-chair of the Greening Greater Toronto. Ms. Ligeti is a lawyer and she teaches environmental law in the University of Toronto, Graduate Program in Environmental Science. Ms. Ligeti was Ontario’s first Environmental Commissioner from 1995 until 1999. She was the Principal, Sheppard Campus, Seneca College of Applied Arts and Technology and Chair, School of Legal and Public Administration.

Stuart Toye, Treasurer

Stuart Toye is a Chartered Accountant and Chartered Business Valuator with Kalex Valuations Inc. in Toronto.  His work focuses on the valuation of privately-held business interests and providing financial litigation support.  Stuart joined the PIF Board in 2010.

Mr. Toye was born in Scotland and grew up in St. Catharines, Ontario where he graduated of Brock University.  In the early 1990′s, Stuart spent two summers planting thousands of trees in northern British Columbia and Alberta and wonders how they are doing today.  In his spare time, Stuart enjoys playing sports and spending time outdoors, specifically enjoying Ontario’s provincial parks and camping/canoeing in Killarney and Algonquin.

Caroline Underwood, Secretary

Caroline Underwood is a Senior Producer with the CBC’s Science and Natural History Unit and is the Series Producer of One Ocean. The unit’s flagship programme, “The Nature of Things with David Suzuki”, is an award winning series that is seen in many countries around the world and will be celebrating its 50th season in the fall of 2010.

Caroline Underwood has also produced, directed and written more than twenty-five of her own award-winning documentaries for “The Nature of Things” and independent production companies. The focus of her work has been the natural world and she has travelled to many remote locations, from the Arctic to the Antarctic, to reveal the beauty, complexity and the threats facing some of the planet’s last great wildernesses and their inhabitants. She has had countless extraordinary wildlife experiences: from standing among half a million caribou, to camping on the tundra where wolves walked past her tent, to unexpected encounters with a grizzly bears in the remote rainforests of British Columbia, and even with the microscopic creatures that we share our bodies with for her popular documentary “Up Close and Personal: The Ecology of David Suzuki”.

No stranger to debate, she has explored many contentious subjects over the years – the use of animals in medical research, wolf management and climate change. She is a founding member and past president of the international organization Filmmakers for Conservation.

Caroline Underwood and her team were one of the first to take HD cameras to the Arctic to document the impact of climate change on wildlife on the ice and underwater for the Gemini Award winner, “Lord’s of the Arctic”, (an international co-production). Some of her recent programmes are: “Suzuki Diaries: Coastal Canada”, “Walking with Ghosts”, and the three-part series “Antarctic Mission”.

Joan Prowse

Joan Prowse is co-founder of the independent Toronto based production company CineFocus Canada (http://cinefocus.com). As a producer, director, writer and editor, she creates television documentaries, interactive projects, and video shorts that tell compelling Canadian stories to a global audience.

Through CineFocus she has created numerous projects with environmental themes including Greenpeace: A Canadian Discovery for the Discovery Channel, Green Jobs (screened at Planet in Focus in 2003) and Arbor Alma, which she produced and her partner, John Bessai directed, for Bravo!Fact.

Her most recent documentary series, GreenHeroes is a cross-platform project that launched at www.greenheroes.tv and airs on TVO. In 2010 it was nominated for two awards at the Banff World Television Festival and featured at Planet in Focus. Joan is a graduate of Ryerson’s Radio and Television Arts program and is an alumnus of the Interactive Project Lab at Norman Jewison’s Canadian Film Centre.

Andrew Nisker

Andrew Nisker made his first environmental documentary Garbage! The Revolution Starts at Home over a five-year period. Released in 2007, Garbage! has been seen by over two million people internationally and has been translated into six languages. Nisker produced his second environmental documentary, Chemerical. Chemerical explores the life cycle of everyday household cleaners and hygiene products to prove that, thanks to our clean obsession, we are drowning in a sea of toxicity. Nisker is continuing to produce documentaries and is in post production on a touching film about the haunting effects of Agent Orange called Orange Witness.

Nisker regularly participates in panels and has been a part of programs at DOC Canada, NWA Green Expo for WalMart Home Office, Northwestern University and has also been a regular jury member for Earth Day Canada’s Home Town Heroes.

As an educator, Nisker has held environmental and filmmaking workshops in Canada, Italy and the United States in collaboration with various film festivals and school boards and is currently teaching part time at the OCAD University in downtown Toronto.
When at home he spends the majority of his time playing shinny and catch, cooking and skiing with his son Sebastian.

Keir Brownstone

Keir Brownstone is the General Manager of GLOBE Inc. a subsidiary or Social Housing Services Corporation. GLOBE has a mandate as a social enterprise to act as a catalyst in transforming primarily the social housing sector into a green sustainable culture through the development and delivery of technical, training and education services.  Prior to joining GLOBE Keir was the Green Plan Manager for Toronto Community Housing (TCHC). He was responsible for coordination and implementation of an ambitious program that included energy efficiency, water conservation, waste reduction and diversion, education and training, procurement policies and green spaces renewal.

Before joining TCHC, Keir was the General Manager of Green Saver, a leader in residential and small business energy efficiency in the Greater Toronto Region helping to develop programs such as Energuide for Houses, Home Rewards, Home Rewards for Affordable Housing and Go Low Flow.

Keir has an extensive background in private business and marketing as the Managing Director of Robin Kay Clothing Company, at one time one of Canada’s leading environmental retailers, and Marketing Director for OXFAM Canada. Keir has consulted with the City of London in the U.K. on residential energy efficiency and has been an active participant in the creation of the City of Toronto’s ‘Greening Greater Toronto’ initiative, the Toronto Smog Summit and the Toronto Energy Efficiency Education Action Committee. Most recently Keir was an invited speaker at the Eco Districts conference in Portland Oregon, Eco City conference in Montreal Canada, World Sustainable Building Conference in Melbourne Australia, the Zukunft Haus Convention in Berlin Germany and the Green Build Conference in Boston U.S.A..

Joe Castrilli

Joseph F. Castrilli is recognized as one of the most experienced environmental lawyers in Canada: by the Law Society of Upper Canada, where he is certified as a specialist in environmental law; and by Lexpert, where he is identified year after year as an environmental lawyer repeatedly recommended by his peers.

He has represented or advised international bodies, government, the private sector, First Nations, non-government organizations, community groups, and individuals with environmental concerns. He has argued cases, settled disputes, solved problems, and advanced the development of environmental law.

Anne Wordsworth

Anne Wordsworth has worked extensively in the fields of environment and health.  In association with the Canadian Environmental Law Association and as an environmental consultant, she has written major law and policy reports on chemicals, environmental health, toxics use reduction, water issues, indoor air pollutants and international comparisons of laws.  She has also been the Executive Assistant and a Senior Policy Advisor for two Ontario Ministers of Environment and Energy.  Her media and communications experience includes production and research for three CBC national television shows: Market Place, Man Alive and The Health Show.  Her most recent production is a public education video called “Lead-Stick Beware”, which won the US-based Campaign for Safe Cosmetics’ “Kiss Lead Goobdbye” contest.  She is currently doing her Masters in Environmental Studies at York University.