Katja Esson
Recipient Information
Location
Miami , Florida
Medium
Film
Year of Award
2027
Grant or Fellowship
Southern Artist Spotlight Grant
Grant Amount
$0
Katja Esson is an Emmy and Academy Award-nominated filmmaker based in Miami. Her most recent feature, RAZING LIBERTY SQUARE, about climate gentrification in Miami, was nominated for an Emmy in 2025. Known for her intimate, character-driven documentaries, her credits include FERRY TALES, which turns the unlikely setting of the Staten Island Ferry powder room into a celebration of sisterhood and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Short (HBO 2004). Her 2011 film SKYDANCER, about two Mohawk ironworkers torn between the Akwesasne Reservation and New York City, received nominations for Best Film, Best Director, and Best Cinematography at the Shanghai Film Festival and premiered on PBS and ARTE in 2011. POETRY OF RESILIENCE was nominated for the Cinema for Peace Award in 2012. Her five-part documentary series BACKROADS USA (2014) and AMERICAN RIVERS (2016) premiered on ARTE and PBS in 2018. Her three-part series FINDING FLORIDA premiered on ARTE in 2026. A Simons-Public Humanities Fellow at the University of Kansas, Katja's films have screened at the Museum of Modern Art, American Museum of Natural History, and the Smithsonian. Katja’s work has been supported by the National Endowment for the Arts, the Knight Foundation, ITVS, IDA Enterprise, NYSCA, the Redford Center, Sundance, and the Ford Foundation. She is a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
Contact
Email Kaja Esson
www.razinglibertysquare.com
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