Panels and Workshops
Variety's 10 Artisans to Watch
Variety senior artisans editor Jazz Tangcay hosts the second annual 10 Artisans to Watch panel, spotlighting the behind-the-scenes artists and rising stars in their fields who were invaluable to the year’s best films.
Honorees
Dominique Dawson, costume designer, Origin
San Francisco native Dominique Dawson is a multidisciplinary creative with a background in theater, fashion, and film. Dawson attended college in New York and began her career directing plays before making a jump to wardrobe and styling on the 2007 short film Security. Dawson has designed costumes for more than 160 TV episodes on shows such as American Koko, Family Time, In the Cut, My Crazy Roommate, DMZ, Swarm, Colin in Black and White, and L.A.'s Finest. Dawson also joined the costume department for The Last Black Man in San Francisco, jumping at the opportunity to represent her hometown on screen.
Melissa Forney, hair department head, Rustin
A Texas native, Melissa Forney's journey in the world of hairstyling is a testament to her unwavering passion and boundless creativity in a film and TV career that stretches more than 25 years. Forney has worked with a diverse array of actors, including Tracee Ellis Ross, Sanaa Lathan, Regina Hall, Nia Long, Cicely Tyson, Katherine Heigl, Luke Wilson, Danny Glover, Terrence Howard, Kristen Stewart, Keke Palmer, LisaGay Hamilton, Taraji P. Henson, Mahershala Ali, and Jamie Foxx, among countless others. Her credits include Friday Night Lights, The Kingdom, Hancock, Selma, Empire, BMF, and more.
Nick Houy, editor, Barbie
Nick Houy is a New York-based film editor. Houy has edited both of Greta Gerwig's Academy Award-nominated films, Little Women and Lady Bird, as well as her summer blockbuster Barbie. Houy won an Emmy Award in 2017 for editing the HBO miniseries The Night Of. He also received an Independent Spirit Award nomination in 2018 for editing Jonah Hill's film Mid90s. In 2022, Houy also edited Hill's critically acclaimed Netflix documentary Stutz.
Shabier Kirchner, cinematographer, Past Lives
Shabier Kirchner is an accomplished cinematographer who has worked on acclaimed films and TV shows like Celine Song's Past Lives, Steve McQueen's Small Axe, and Akinola Davies' Sundance Film Festival-winning short Lizard. The Antigua native won a BAFTA and was nominated for an Emmy Award for his contributions to McQueen's BBC anthology series. He also earned an Independent Spirit Award nomination for his work on Annie Silverstein's Bull. Kirchner's other credits include Only You, Sollers Point, Skate Kitchen, and That One Day.
James Price, production designer, Poor Things
UK native James Price began his career working in TV and film art departments on BBC and ITV dramas like Spooks, Hearts of Gold, and Reversals. After establishing himself as an art director, Price has worked on diverse projects like Bullet Boy, Grow Your Own, Southcliffe, Kill Your Friends, Paddington 2, and Trust. Price jumped to film production design for the first time in 2018's The Nest and has since worked on The Ipcress File, Speak No Evil, and The Iron Claw.
Carol Rasheed, makeup department head, The Color Purple
Emmy Award-nominated makeup artist Carol Rasheed's film and TV career spans across three decades. Her credits include Footloose, The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, Solace, Fist Fight, Barely Lethal, Delilah, Greenleaf, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, Three Months, and A Man in Full. She earned an Emmy Award nomination for her work on the Showtime series The First Lady. In 2016, Rasheed founded the TV & Film Makeup Academy in Atlanta, where she and her team of seasoned professionals offer unique courses to instruct aspiring makeup artists entering the entertainment industry.
James Shirley, sound design editor, Moonage Daydream, The Little Mermaid
James Shirley is an Emmy Award and MPSE Award-nominated sound and music editor based in London. Shirley got his film and TV start cueing and cutting ADR for the countless puppets in Netflix's reboot of The Dark Crystal and has since contributed to I Wanna Dance With Somebody, The Banshees of Inisherin, Cyrano, Moonage Daydream, and Bob Marley: One Love. A keen musician himself, James plays the piano and the saxophone, and has been known to occasionally dust off the accordion in his parents' attic.
Anthony Willis, composer, Saltburn
BAFTA-nominated composer Anthony Willis has quickly become one of the most highly sought-after composers in Hollywood. A protege of Academy Award-nominated composer John Powell, he has also worked alongside noted composers Henry Jackman, Harry Gregson-Williams, Alex Heffes, Dominic Lewis, Mark Isham, and Heitor Pereira. Willis has scored Promising Young Woman, M3GAN, Solitary, How to Train Your Dragon: Homecoming, Knack II, The Hive, and One Last Night. The London native has also contributed additional music to franchises like Rio, Star Wars, Bourne, Jumanji, Despicable Me, and Pirates of the Caribbean.
Kaitlyn Yang, visual effects artist, American Born Chinese
Over more than 15 years in the visual effects industry, Kaitlyn Yang has worked her way from an intern to a visual effects supervisor and CEO of the postproduction company Alpha Studios. Yang's credits include the TV series Grey's Anatomy, The Shrink Next Door, Raised by Wolves, Best Foot Forward, Absentia, The Innocent Man, The Good Doctor, and American Born Chinese. Yang is also the co-founder of 1IN4, an intersectional coalition of disabled creatives focused on long-term institutional shifts to increase the employment and authentic representation of disabled people in media.
Matt Yocum, sound editor, American Fiction
Matt Yocum (B.F.A., sound design, 2015) is a Los Angeles-based sound designer and re-recording mixer. His diverse portfolio spans studio feature films, television, podcasts, commercials, music videos, and more. In 2023, he received Emmy Award nominations for his work on Hotel Transylvania 4: Transformania and the hit HBO series The Last of Us. Yocum's credits include Devotion, The Cloverfield Paradox, Pet Sematary, and Venom: Let There Be Carnage. In 2021, his sound design and mix for the podcast The Left Right Game, the first narrative podcast mixed in Dolby Atmos, earned him the inaugural Podcast Academy Award for Best Sound Design.