Industry Day 2025 - Queer East

Queer East Industry is our initiative to connect with emerging curators, filmmakers, community facilitators, film students, researchers and like-minded industry professionals. It aims to utilise shared resources, exchange innovative ideas, and advocate for best practices in advancing the film sector.

Since 2020, Queer East has become a beacon for alternative, radical and multifaceted LGBTQ+ and Asian storytelling, and has gained widespread recognition from the industry, creatives, and the wider public in the UK and beyond. This newly launched industry programme will create a space for industry practitioners to discuss the pressing issues affecting the exhibition of queer, Asian, and alternative cinema.

Queer East Industry Day is jam-packed with activities, including talks, panels, and networking sessions. We will invite guest speakers from queer festivals and grassroots film collectives who have dared to challenge existing industry frameworks, and facilitate a network for knowledge sharing on audience engagement.

With thanks to the BFI Inclusion Team.

11:15 – 11:20
Welcome Introduction by Yi Wang

11:20 – 12:35
Queer Queries: An Open Discussion about LGBTQ+ Festivals

Grassroots and independent filmmakers have historically been at the forefront of LGBTQ+ cinema, creating a space for queer people to come together. But in an increasingly interconnected film landscape, where mainstream festivals now have LGBTQ+ strands, are community-focused queer festivals more vital than ever? This roundtable discussion features a range of queer film programmers, who share their curatorial practices, community-driven strategies, and visions of how grassroots festivals might shape queer cinema in future.

Speakers:
Harriet Taylor, Queer Vision Film Festival
Indigo Korres, Scottish Queer International Film Festival
Olivia Thomas, Leeds Queer Film Festival
Yi Wang, Queer East Festival

12:45 – 13:45
Filmmaker Focus: Tzu-Hui Peng & Ping-Wen Wang

Visiting London for the UK premiere of A Journey in Spring, directors Ping-Wen Wang and Tzu-Hui Peng join us for a Filmmaker Focus. Wang is a prolific maker of short films, known for Between Us (2014), Labyrinth (2016) and Military Dog (2019). Peng is a multi-disciplinary artist who has worked in media, including video installation and experimental film. Together, they directed A Journey in Spring, for which they won the Silver Shell Award for Best Director at the 71st San Sebastian International Film Festival. Discussing their diverse screen output, the pair will consider how they have honed their craft over the years.

Lunch Break

14:30 – 15:45
Curating Asian Cinema in the UK

Given the global appetite for Asian cinema, how have different organisations sought to ensure it reaches UK audiences? In this conversation about curation, we welcome guests from MilkTea, Hong Kong Film Festival UK, and Sine Screen, each of which takes a very different approach to programming East and South-East Asian cinema. From large-scale releases on the big screen to the exhibition of alternative artists’ moving image work, the programmers and curators reflect on how they run events and engage communities.

Speakers:
Cici Peng, Sine Screen
Chi Thai, MilkTea Films
Ching Wong, Hong Kong Film Festival UK

Host:
Lydia Wu, Association for Curators and Programmers of Asian Cinemas / Newcastle University

16:00 – 17:15
Radical Narratives: Rethinking Film Exhibition

Film exhibitors must navigate an industrial context that broadly favours mainstream topics, formats, and audiences. By contrast, the guests in this discussion represent organisations that screen non-mainstream films by directors from global majority communities. The TAPE Collective screens work by under-represented filmmakers, especially women of colour; Berwick Film and Media Arts is geared toward radical, experimental, and avant-garde practice; the Brixton Community Cinema / Atlas Cinema addresses uneven access, making films available to local communities. In this interactive conversation, our three guests share their experiences showcasing diverse voices and narratives, and reaching new audiences.

Speakers:
Abiba Coulibaly, Atlas Cinema / Brixton Community Cinema
Isra Al Kassi, T A P E Collective
Peter Taylor, Berwick Film & Media Arts Festival

17:30 – 20:00
Queer East Industry Mixer

A relaxed drinks event where you can chat with other attendees and some of the guests who have joined us for the day’s talks. For those who wish, there will be the opportunity to give a 1-minute public introduction to your work.