Join us as we celebrate the amazing storytellers featured in this inaugural festival with a brunch for the winners of this year's storytelling awards! 

Catering provided by River Willow Culinary. Thanks to our sponsors Foundation for Appalachian Ohio and WOUB for allowing this event to be FREE for all! 

Keynote Address: Using Film to Tell Authentic Appalachian Stories with Elaine McMillion Sheldon

Join us at brunch for a talk by Elaine McMillion Sheldon, an Academy Award-nominated, Peabody-winning, and two-time Emmy-winning documentary filmmaker. Sheldon premiered her latest feature-length documentary KING COAL at the 2023 Sundance Film Festival. The New York Times named it a Critics’ Pick, Esquire and Marie Claire named it one of the best documentaries of the year. KING COAL screened at over 40 festivals, 50 theaters and had its national broadcast premiere as the season opener for PBS’ POV, America’s longest running non-fiction series. Sheldon is also the director of two Netflix Original Documentaries - HEROIN(E) and RECOVERY BOYS - that explore America's opioid crisis. She has been named a Creative Capital Awardee, Guggenheim Fellow, a USA Fellow by United States Artists, and one of the "25 New Faces of Independent Film,” by Filmmaker Magazine. She has been nominated for six Emmy awards, three Peabody awards, and a Livingston Award. In 2024, Sheldon was invited to join the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

Elaine's keynote is made possible thanks to the support of our sponsor, Friends of the Athens County Public Libraries