Cheryl Dunye

Cheryl Dunye, a native of Philadelphia, was born in Liberia in 1966. Cheryl is the director and creator of the first African-American lesbian feature film, The Watermelon Woman.

Dunye received her BA from Temple University and her MFA from Rutgers University's Mason Gross School of the Arts, where she used the video art form to explore race, sex, and class in the lives of black women.

Dunye has received numerous honors for her work in the media arts. In 1997, THE WATERMELON WOMAN was included in the Whitney Biennial. In 1996 the film was awarded best gay feature in the Berlin Film Festival and best feature in the Los Angeles OutFest, Torino, and Creteil Film Festivals.

In 1995 her short film GREETINGS FROM AFRICA was included in the Sundance Film Festival. Dunye's other works have been screened at festivals in New York, London, Tokyo, Cape Town, and Sydney. She has received grants from the Astraea Foundation (1992) and Frameline (1992); fellowships from Art Matters, Inc. (1992), and Rutgers University (1990, 1991); honored with the MARMAF Pennsylvania Major Artist Award (1993) and the Anonymous Was A Woman Award (1997); a recipient of a media grant from the National Endowment of the Arts (1995); a the fellowship from Rockefeller Foundation (1998); the prestigious Anonymous was a Woman Award (1998); and a dramatic jury member at the Sundance film festival (1999).

In addition Dunye has written articles for "Time Out", "Felix" and "Movement Research." She currently teaches in the Department of Art at the University of California, Riverside and the Department of Media Studies at Pitzer College in Southern California and is at work on a script for her next feature film about a young African American woman who is admitted to the same Correctional Facility as her mother.

Using documentary, fiction, and pseudo-documentary styles of filmmaking, Dunye creates what she calls the "Dunyementary." Her video, The Potluck and the Passion, was included in the 1993 Whitney Biennial. Dunye's other works have been screened at festivals in New York, London, South Africa, and Paris.

She has received grants from the Astrea Foundation (1992) and Frameline (1992); fellowships from Art Matters, Inc. (1992), and Rutgers University (1990, 1991); honored with the MARMAF Pennsylvania Major Artists Award (1993); and a recipient of a media grant from the National Endowment of the Arts (1995). In addition, Dunye has written articles for "Felix" and "Movement Research."

She is currently a part-time instructor in the Department of Media Studies at Pitzer College in southern California, a board member of OUTFEST in Los Angeles, a member of the IFP/West and Film Arts Foundation as well as being the mother of 2 children.

Source: Cheryl Duyne's Website: http://www.cheryldunye.com/index.html
Stranger Baby Productions: http://www.strangerbaby.com/index.htm

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Cheryl Dunye . . .