March is Women’s History Month—a great opportunity to put an even brighter spotlight on women from the College. This week, we’re getting to know Maro Chermayeff, chair and founder of SVA's MFA Social Documentary Film department and an Emmy- and Peabody-winning documentary filmmaker. Her most recent directorial effort was the highly celebrated Atlanta's Missing and Murdered: The Lost Children for HBO which she co-directed with SocDoc faculty member Sam Pollard. Her work has garnered scores of honors, awards, significant critical acclaim and has appeared on TV channels all over the world, including CNN Originals, PBS, A&E, The Travel Channel, Bravo, Discovery, Arte France/Germany, France 2, BBC, Sky Arts, and Channel Four U.K.

Chermayeff and her producing partner Jeff Dupre founded the companies Show of Force, Force Film Foundation and Show of Force Social Good in 2006, and memorable credits include producing the award-winning feature documentary Marina Abramović: The Artist Is Present and Kehinde Wiley, An Economy Of Grace. We recently interviewed with the SocDoc chair and filmmaker to check in on where she's at.

Tell us a little about your history with SVA.

I first was introduced by Steven Heller to David Rhodes and the SVA Community in 2006 and the seed of possibility for an MFA in social documentary film was planted. I had known about the school for many years through my father, graphic designer Ivan Chermayeff and his colleagues Milton Glaser and Henry Wolf. After pulling together an amazing group of documentarians—who are a core group of faculty that still remain today—we began to work with young filmmakers to create the thriving MFA program we have today. Now some 12 years later we have hundreds of alumni and numerous award-winning films that began in the department as thesis work and launched as first films for this next generation of working artists and filmmakers.

How has teaching filmmaking in a pandemic forced you to adapt and be creative?

Filmmaking is a collaborative and hands-on medium, so the pandemic has forced us to re-engage previously un-exercised creative muscles. We have been inspired to keep our students excited in online classes and to work together with our industry to create safe ways to work in the world. The very concept of documentary filmmaking requires being out in the world and being with other people, so though creating intimacy in a distanced world is hard to achieve, this will pass and we all will have learned from it.

In honor of Women’s History Month, who are the female filmmakers inspiring you right now?

Presently I am loving and appreciating Kirsten Johnson both as a friend and colleague (she was SVA SocDoc faculty). Kirsten’s first film, Cameraperson, was moving and evocative, and her recent film about her father, Dick Johnson is Dead, is now nominated for everything under the sun and shortlisted for an Oscar. It is heartwarming, funny and original and I absolutely loved it. I also love and was deeply touched and inspired by The Mole Agent. It is a very original piece of work by filmmaker Maite Alberdi from Chile. Her distinct voice as a Latin American filmmaker is inspiring.

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