Derek Knowles is a documentary filmmaker and cinematographer specializing in vérité camerawork and stories which explore the the maternal. His work has been supported by the Tribeca Film Institute, Kartemquin Films, and the Berkeley Film Foundation, featured as a Vimeo Staff pick, and has appeared on The New York Times, The New Yorker, The Atlantic, and PBS Frontline. His last two films have explored the human fallout from California wildfires, most recently with Last Days at Paradise High, which premiered on The New Yorker in August 2020 and will play at the San Francisco Intl. Film Festival, and beforehand with After the Fire, winner of the Tribeca Film Institute’s “If/Then” Shorts Award and featured on Ryot Films and throughout California PBS stations. After the Fire also premiered at Big Sky and later screened at the Cleveland, Maryland, Sun Valley, and Nantucket international film festivals, as well as other festivals around the world. In 2018, he was an Artist-in-Residence at “thecamp” in the south of France and created an interactive media project aimed at connecting young and older generations. He also recently served as a cinematographer for Al Jazeera’s Emmy award-winning series, Fault Lines.
Derek Knowles
