Organisational Approach

Anurima Bhargava

Chair of the Board

Anurima Bhargava is the Founder and President of Anthem of Us, a strategic advisory firm promoting dignity and justice in the building of our workplaces, schools, and communities. She led federal civil rights enforcement in schools and institutions of higher education at the U.S. Department of Justice during the Obama administration, and previously directed the education practice at the NAACP Legal Defense Fund.    

Barbara Truyen

Non-Executive Board Member - Doc Society Foundation Board

Barbara Truyen works in the documentary scene since the early 90’s. As a producer, for festivals, forums, as a sales agent and financier. After heading Dutch public broadcaster VPRO’s documentary department for 15 years Barbara is currently focusing on international coproduction and strategic alliances for both Dutch documentary films and series that have international potential and international projects which are relevant to a Dutch audience. In this role she is trying to come up with new ways of coproducing to create a healthier ecosystem that benefits all.

How can public broadcasters work smarter together within the EBU, or with streamers and private equity? In her now 35-year career she sees her role as a kind of 'creators-creator'. She wants to inspire, to ensure that filmmakers can shape their creativity under the best circumstances to make films. She has helped to develop, finance, and supervise the editing and release of approximately 250 documentaries. Each film has its own substantive challenge and dynamics in the team of makers. The great thing is that documentaries can be about anything: social topics, journalism, art, culture, human interest. In form they are observational, interview driven, ego documents, discourse, animation, experimentation, and hybrid forms. Films like Emmy winner Bellingcat: truth in a post truth world, Flee, Armadillo, The Cleaners, Vivan las Antipodas. Kings of Pastry, the Queen of Versailles, The Trial of Ratko Mladic and Steve mcQueens’ Occupied city. She is the chairlady of the EBU documentary group.

Dilhani Wijeyesekera

Trustee

Dilhani is a recognised development and social change expert who has held a range of senior roles working with charities, government, UN agencies, foundations and corporates in the UK and around the world shaping strategy, investing, and institutional practice. She brings significant knowledge of programming with young people, adolescent girls, and women in the field of governance and livelihoods.

She spent a significant proportion of her career based in East Africa, and since returning to the UK has led a high-profile change agenda as an influencer with government, funders and civil society, to Shift Power to local institutions, reform representation through innovative programmes and investments to cultural and creative institutions in the UK and Africa, and tackle issues of equity and representation in the funding, philanthropic and creative sectors.

During her time in Tanzania, Dilhani led the country’s first at scale pilot scale out of school programme for Adolescent Girls Mabinti Tushike Hatamu with the Government of Tanzania, Restless Development and UNICEF winning global recognition from UNAIDS and the Resolve Award, and later acknowledged at the launch of the Global Goals in 2015 in Barack Obama’s opening speech to the UN ONE and President Obama, Eva's Wish.

Since returning to the UK, she has held a leadership roles at Restless Development and Comic Relief, and advised funders including DFID, USAID, Mastercard Foundation, Sainsbury’s and KPMG on their social impact strategies. She has led sector influencing and advisory into Justine Greening’s (SOS DFID) office resulting in its Youth Strategy and the high profile Global Youth Summit, and major campaigns including Youth Power (2015) culminating action at the launch of the SDGs in 2015.

Now at Comic Relief, Dilhani is overseeing its first steps in influencing including building strategic relationships with influencers of bi-lateral institutions, within government and parliament, and overseeing its first parliamentary reception hosted by Sir Lenny Henry and youth advocates from South Africa. Dilhani has led efforts to shift its storytelling through critical platforms including Africa No Filter a co-investment fund to generate positive narratives about the continent; and Sema Stori an innovative fund investing in emerging film makers in East Africa in factual documentary; and overseen progress on ethics and climate responsibility establishing the organisation’s first ESG strategy. Dilhani has gained recognition for the role she has played during the Covid-19 emergency in advocating for and investing in Black, Asian and Ethnic Minorities in the UK, and working across funders and government to publish recommendations on equality and equity in funding in the UK.

In her spare time, Dilhani is an active yoga, mindfulness and meditation teacher and leads collective care programmes for communities working with trauma.

Fatima Ibrahim

Trustee

Fatima is the Co-Executive Director of The Green New Deal UK. She is one of the commissioners on IPPR's Environmental Justice Commission. Fatima is a climate activist and social justice campaigner, and much of her work has been spent campaigning and building solidarity with international movements. She has worked for the global NGO Avaaz, EU citizens movement WeMove.eu and was one of the lead organisers of the People’s Climate March. She has also spent years organising with and supporting the UK Youth Climate Coalition. Fatima has already worked with Doc Society, featuring in the Climate Reframe.

Heather Grady

Board Member

Heather is a Vice President in the San Francisco office of Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors and leads the organization’s strategy and program development in global philanthropy and systems change. Heather advises funders from the US and other countries on philanthropic strategy. Her approach has been shaped in by two decades of living in Asia, Africa, and the Middle East, managing long-term development and humanitarian programs. As Vice President at the Rockefeller Foundation she oversaw portfolios including climate change, health, and employment. She serves on the boards of the Dropbox Foundation, Business and Human Rights Resource Centre, Forum for the Future, the Wildlife Justice Commission, and Doc Society.

Kat Craig

Chair of the Board

Kat is an award-winning human rights lawyer, published author and experienced social change consultant. She has challenged the abuse of power by State bodies and multinational corporations in the court of law and the court of public opinion in countries including the UK, Germany, Colombia, Yemen, Pakistan and the US and regularly appears as an expert commentator on national and international media. Kat also runs a not-for-profit consultancy helping professional and elite athletes use their platform to improve the lives of others. Her clients campaign on issues ranging from the prevention of child abuse in football, to the use of sport to improve social cohesion between refugees and host communities. Kat has a passion for supporting exceptional people who use new and creative ways to make the world a better place, which is why she has found great pleasure and satisfaction working with Doc Society on a range of projects over the last five years.

Katharine Wilkinson

Board Member

Dr. Katharine Wilkinson is an author, strategist, and teacher, working to heal the planet we call home. She is Vice President of Communication & Engagement at the nonprofit Project Drawdown and was the Senior Writer of Drawdown — the New York Times bestseller on climate solutions. Known for her work at the intersection of climate, gender equality, and women’s leadership, Katharine’s TED Talk on the topic has more than 1.5 million views. In 2019, TIME featured her as one of 15 “women who will save the world.” The Boston Globe dubbed her first book, Between God & Green, “a vitally important, even subversive, story” for its exploration of climate change and evangelical Christianity. Katharine speaks, moderates, and facilitates across diverse forums, including National Geographic, Skoll World Forum, and the United Nations. She holds a doctorate in Geography & Environment from Oxford, where she was a Rhodes Scholar, and resides in Atlanta, Georgia.

K. Biswas

Trustee

K Biswas is a critic who has written about culture and politics for the New Statesman, New York Times, The Nation, Le Monde Diplomatique, and the Times Literary Supplement. He is the Editor of Representology: The Journal of Media and Diversity, Chair of the charity Heard, and Director of Resonance FM, Europe's most popular community radio station. A media theorist and long-standing expert on populism and the rise of the far right, he has worked with Doc Society on storytelling impact campaigns, facilitating conversations around climate and democracy, and organising parliamentary screenings.

Keri Putnam

Board Member

Keri Putnam is a CEO and founder, creative producer, strategic advisor, and senior media executive who has supported, developed, and produced bold, original media from new and established talent throughout her career. In 2022, Putnam launched Putnam Pictures to produce film and television from creators with distinct and adventurous vision.  She also advises media companies, start-ups, and cultural organizations as a consultant, board member, and advisory board member.

Putnam served as CEO of Sundance Institute from 2010-2021. She was responsible for the Sundance Film Festival and a wide array of year-round global lab and granting programs for new storytellers in film, series, documentary, theater, and new media. She and her team championed early work from scores of filmmakers who went onto successful careers in film and television, including several Academy Award and Emmy winners. With positive financial results every year, Sundance Institute grew its revenue by 300% during her tenure, launched pioneering digital products, innovative strategic partnerships, and international festivals and programs in the UK, Asia, the Middle East, Africa, and Latin America.The organization also significantly invested in diversity, equity, and inclusion as leading advocates for historically underrepresented voices in media. 

Prior to Sundance, Putnam served as President of Production at Miramax Films, a division of the Walt Disney Company, where she oversaw a global team in development, production, post-production, acquisitions, and production finance. During her four-year tenure, Miramax films were recognized with 34 Academy Award nominations and 7 wins.

Putnam began her career as an assistant in original programming at HBO and ended her decade+ tenure there as Executive Vice President of movies and limited series, where she supervised production of over 45 films and miniseries that collectively received over 50 Emmy Awards and nominations, as well as numerous Peabody Awards, Golden Globes, and other honors. She also helped launched the theatrical label Picturehouse run by HBO in partnership with Fine Line Features.

She serves on the board of AMC Entertainment (public company), privately held independent production company PICTURESTART and German media company Leonine, and on the advisory board of Topic Media. She is board member or advisor to female-led media/tech startups, and several arts and culture nonprofits in the US and UK. Putnam co-founded and serves on the leadership council of ReFrame, a leading organization advocating for diversity in media. She is a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, an A.D. White Professor-at-Large at Cornell University, a mentor at USC’s Stark Producing Program, and an advisory council member at Brooklyn College’s Feirstein School. She is also a founding member of the LA Women’s Political Caucus and member of the creative council at EMILY’s List. Putnam graduated from Harvard College and is the mother of two grown children. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband and their two dogs.

Mathieu Ajan

Trustee

Mathieu Ajan is Founder & Artistic Director, Bounce Cinema. Bounce is a community helping you discover and connect with the world of film. “Through our programme of screenings, talks and workshops, we bring thousands of people together to celebrate cinema. Bounce is an independent organisation and reinvests a percentage of their time and resources into supporting new and emerging talent."

BFI NETWORK Executive, Commissioning Short Films & Early Development Features

Mathieu curated & programmed for: The Tate Modern, Institute Of Contemporary Arts & Aesthetica Short Film Festival.

Mathieu is another young Black organiser who has much greater ambitions to grow Bounce into a national Black screening and mentoring programme.

Oliver Rivers (UK)

Chair, Non-executive Board Member - Doc Society Foundation Board & Stichting

Oliver is a trustee of three charities: Poetry London, the Legal Action Group, and the Britten Pears Foundation. He has an MBA from London Business School, but he did his first degree at the Royal College of Music, and music remains one of his great passions. In his not very extensive spare time he can usually be found at the Wigmore Hall.

Peter Noorlander

Trustee

Peter has spent his professional life defending journalists and the right to freedom of expression around the world. He co-founded and led MediaDefence.org, which provides legal defence to journalists, and he has been at the heart of international campaigns on issues such as the right to information and ending the imprisonment of journalists for defamation. Peter is passionate about leaving the planet in a better state than he found it and he volunteers his time fundraising and providing support for Extinction Rebellion, which he urges you to support - the disruption they cause is nothing compared to what we face when we don’t reverse our destructive habits. In addition to DocSociety, Peter is a trustee of Privacy International, which fights for a world where technology will empower and enable us, not exploit our data for profit and power; and he consults on issues of media law and policy, civil society empowerment and organisational development. When he’s not at his desk he’s probably out running.

Prash Naik

Non-Executive Board Member – Doc Society Foundation Board

Prash is the former General Counsel for Channel 4 Television and a co-founder of the specialist media practice Creators Counsel through which he also acts as legal counsel to the Doc Society advising on their film slate.

He has spent over 30 years advising, defending and protecting filmmakers. At Channel 4 he played a key role in creative risk-taking and is much sought after as the “go-to” lawyer to get high-risk films to air. He is also highly regarded as a crisis management specialist having advised at executive and board level on many high-profile cases ranging from press controversies, to the protection of sources, and cases involving the detention, kidnap & ransom of filmmakers.

He is a member of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts and a former trustee on the board of Action Aid UK the international charity that works to alleviate poverty and injustice.

Rob Berkeley

Chair of the Board

Award-winning busybody, recovering academic and reformed social reformer, Rob is Lead Organiser of BlkOutUK.com, a community-owned media platform, workspace and collaboration hub for and by Black bi/gay/trans men. He recently completed a stint advising the BBC on accountability and audience engagement. Impatient with injustice and exasperated by wasted potential, he volunteers on the boards of the Baring Foundation, and Doc Society, has previously served on the boards of LGBT rights charity Stonewall, the Equality and Diversity Forum, and been Chair of sexual health organisation, Naz Project (NPL). He was Exec Director of the racial justice think-tank Runnymede Trust (2009-14). Continuing his academic writing on education, social justice and community organising, he was recently appointed Simon Industrial Fellow at the University of Manchester. He has lectured across the UK and beyond, and written for national newspapers on social justice and movement-building. His current fixation on new forms of community ownership, co-production, AI and digital tech and their potential for social justice means that he spends a lot of time on his phone and calls it ‘research’. Dr Berkeley was awarded an MBE in 2015 for services to equality.

Sameer Padania

Non-executive Board Member - Doc Society Foundation Board

Sameer runs Macroscope London, an independent consultancy supporting new strategies in public-interest journalism, human rights & philanthropy. A former Open Society grantmaker and failed documentary maker, he has worked and consulted since 2001 for leading organisations in these fields on a wide range of journalism, digital media, activism, policy and funding initiatives around the world. His most recent publication, for the Ariadne Network, was An Introduction to Funding Journalism & Media. He is on the Advisory Board of First Draft and had been a trustee of 360Giving.

Stephen Dunbar-Johnson

Trustee

Stephen Dunbar-Johnson is the President, International of The New York Times Company. Stephen is responsible for the oversight and strategic development of the Times Company’s international businesses. Dunbar-Johnson was appointed President, International for the New York Times Company in October 2013 to lead the global expansion of The Company.

Prior to The Times, Dunbar-Johnson was Publisher of the International Herald Tribune (IHT), a position he assumed in January 2008. Before joining the IHT in 1998, he held various business development roles in the UK, France and the US over twelve years at the Financial Times. He was educated at Worth School and Kent University in the U.K. and has completed an executive management program at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and the Sulzberger program at the Columbia School of Journalism.

Twiggy Pucci Garcon

Board Member

As an activist, advocate, and healer, Twiggy has collaborated with artists, filmmakers, academics and policymakers to increase visibility of both creative and sociopolitical agendas. Twiggy served at FACES NY, Inc. as a Recruitment Specialist, Senior Community Health Specialist, and more recently a Program Development Specialist and Community Organizer. With over 10 years of experience in the field of general and specialized health education and direct services, she has extensive knowledge of the needs of the LGBTQ youth population and how to foster relationships with organizations that offer effective quality services.

In their current role as Program Director at the True Colors Fund, Twiggy leads their Youth Collaboration programs and True Impact Summit, aimed at not only elevating youth voices but also creating space for partnerships with young adults to lead the movement to end youth homelessness.

In addition to her activism and advocacy work, Twiggy has worked as a model & runway trainer, performance artist, and special events & talent management coordinator. She and her work have been featured in major media publications and media outlets such as OUT Magazine, PAPER Magazine, NY Mag, The Huffington Post, The METRO Weekly, and The Advocate among others. Twiggy was also a featured subject in Timothy Greenfield-Sanders’ and HBO’s documentary feature film, The OUT List and is the co-writer and one of seven subjects in the Sundance-selected, award-winning documentary, KIKI. Twiggy serves as a consultant and choreographer on Ryan Murphy’s hit FX series, POSE. She is also a consulting programmer for Outfest, Newfest, and Outfest Fusion, the Overall Overseer for the Legendary International House of Comme Des Garcon, and the Chief Ambassador for the Center for Black Equity. Twiggy’s continued mission is to elevate the authentic representation of the House|Ballroom Community worldwide.

Vince Warren

Board Member

Vincent is the Executive Director of the Center for Constitutional Rights. He oversees CCR's litigation and advocacy work, which includes using international and domestic law to hold corporations and government officials accountable for human rights abuses; challenging racial, gender and LGBT injustice; and combating the illegal detention at Guantanamo, rendition, and torture.

Prior to his tenure at CCR, Vince was a national senior staff attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union, where he litigated civil rights cases, focusing on affirmative action, racial profiling, and criminal justice reform. Vince was also involved in monitoring South Africa's historic Truth and Reconciliation Commission hearings, and worked as a criminal defense attorney for the Legal Aid Society in Brooklyn. He is a graduate of Haverford College and Rutgers School of Law.

Yvette J. Alberdingk Thijm

Non-executive Board Member - Stichting Doc Society and Doc Society Inc

Yvette is the Executive Director of WITNESS, a global human rights organisation that helps anyone, anywhere to use technology and video to protect and defend human rights. WITNESS collaborates closely with activists to strengthen their use of video and technology to defend the truth, use video stories for advocacy and evidence, and mobilize their communities for change; it advocates to technology companies to ensure that platforms are designed to support human rights users, and it innovates to capture the promise and anticipate the perils of new technologies for a just society. She serves as an advisor/board member for AccessNow, Majal, and Benetech.