2025 Official Short Films Jury
Discover the Official Short Films jury members for the 2025 edition’s awards.
Andrew RUHEMANN
Producer, Director and Founder of PASSION PICTURES
United Kingdom
Andrew Ruhemann, Academy Award-winning filmmaker and founder of PASSION PICTURES, established the studio in 1987 after working on Who Framed Roger Rabbit under mentor Richard Williams. Instilled with the values of story, character, and craft, Andrew embedded these principles into PASSION’s DNA.
Under his leadership, PASSION has become an industry-leading, proudly independent production company, uniquely renowned for both groundbreaking animation and impactful documentaries. Andrew’s directorial debut, The Lost Thing, won an Oscar for Best Animated Short, while PASSION Documentaries won Academy Awards for Searching for Sugar Man and One Day in September. His latest short, The Day I Became a Bird, is soon to be adapted into a video game.
As Creative Director, Ruhemann nurtures emerging talent and ensures PASSION’s stories are told with heart, integrity and, of course, PASSION.
Shiva SADEGH ASADI
Director and Painter
Iran
Shiva Sadegh Asadi is an Iranian painter and filmmaker. She graduated with a master's degree in animation from the University of Art, Tehran.
Her animated films including The Kitten (2013), Maned & Macho (2017), CRAB (2020), Stain (2022) and Aquatic (2024) have won international admiration and awards, notably CRAB, which won the Hiroshima International Animation Festival Jury Award and the Filmfest Dresden Audience Award in 2022.
She has gradually developed her early painterly style by combining it with stop-motion techniques. She uses objects and pieces of paper to create distorted figures and fragmented space, combined with the representation of various viewpoints, perspectives and timeframes in a single shot. She considers her paintings to be the main source of inspiration for her animation films. In both her paintings and films, she focuses on the human being's inner self, dealing with themes including dreams, gloomy fantasies, femininity, abuse, family and relationships.
Chris SANDERS
Animator, Actor, Scriptwriter and Director
USA
Chris Sanders is a four-time Academy Awards nominee, and the writer/director of the critically acclaimed film The Wild Robot. Chris Sanders previously received Oscar nominations for The Croods, How to Train Your Dragon, and Lilo & Stitch.
As an aspiring artist, Sanders applied for and was accepted to CalArts' Animation Program and went on to work for Marvel Productions and later, Walt Disney Studios. Sanders worked as a story artist on Rescuers Down Under and received writer/story by/screenplay credits on Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, The Lion King, and Mulan. As a character designer for DreamWorks Animation, Chris Sanders contributed to the Shrek and Madagascar franchises, as well as Kung Fu Panda.