Chicken & Egg Award

The 2021 Chicken & Egg Award recognizes six advanced-career women and gender nonconforming directors from around the world with $50,000 each; year-long professional mentorship, coaching, and retreats; and support toward the development of new documentary projects.

The Chicken & Egg Award cash grant is unrestricted because we believe that filmmakers themselves know where their careers need to go next and what they need to get there. Recipients have used their unrestricted cash grant to: compensate themselves while their film is in development, pay for personal music lessons, buy a car, pay for medical insurance, work on professional development goals, and more. 

Learn more about the 2021 Chicken & Egg Recipients, their goals and visions, new projects in development, and career growth during their Award year.

“The Chicken & Egg Award is a great motivation for me to continue to develop my uncompromising artistic work and career. Especially now, when the number of institutions with interest in supporting documentary films that do not fit typical formats and conventions are constantly decreasing.”
— Elwira Niewiera, 2021 Chicken & Egg Award Recipient

Elwira Niewiera

New Projects: Hamlet Syndrome, a Shakespeare-inspired portrait of five young Ukranians deeply affected by the 2013 revolution, war, and historic political change; and Freedom Highway, a road documentary about Eastern Europe’s democracy crisis 

Goals: Combine film distribution strategies with broader social campaigns, develop new streams of income, and work on her career sustainability 

Career updates: Hamlet Syndrome wrapped production and post-production and will premiere in 2022

Jialing Zhang

New Projects: The Total Trust (working title) documents China’s unprecedented level of surveillance; My People, My Land (working title) investigates China’s role in Nigeria

Goals: Take control of her career, lead a more balanced life as a filmmaker, and work toward career sustainability

Career updates: In the Same Breath, produced by Jialing, premiered at the 2021 Sundance Film Festival and is now available to stream on HBO

Cristina Ibarra

New Project: El Paso, a new documentary project about her hometown, rooted in her memories of her father’s “yonke” (spanglish for “junkyard”)

Goals: Solidify herself as a leader in the documentary industry and push her career forward in new directions

Career updates: Cristina received a 2021 MacArthur Genius Grant for her work crafting nuanced narratives about borderland communities

Loira Limbal

New project: Between Oceans follows two Black immigrant mothers between seasonal jobs in the United States and their family lives in the Dominican Republic and Jamaica

Goals: Take time for personal sustainability and avoid burnout, structure her life in order to achieve her broader artistic vision, and build new professional relationships

Career updates: Loira was nominated for an NAACP Image Award, took a sabbatical from her position as Senior Vice President for Programs at Firelight Media, and her film Through the Night helped pass a $2.4 billion bill to expand child care across New York State