Beri Shalmashi

(Paris, 1983) is a Dutch writer and filmmaker with roots in Iranian Kurdistan. She writes edgy columns for Volkskrant.nl in which she reveals an authentic voice. For example, she refused to support Nasrdin Dchar's Ieder1 movement. "I've have too much trauma left over from growing up in the Netherlands, too many experiences of being the Other." Shalmashi moved to Iraqi Kurdistan in 2012 to teach at the university of Erbil and to work on new films. She wrote about how the refugee crisis and the war with IS increasingly disrupted life in the city. Ultimately she returned to Amsterdam in 2015. Shalmashi studied at the Film Academy in Amsterdam and has made various films. The television film Mama, a collaboration with Sanne Vogel, was nominated for a Golden Kalf in 2010. The short film Het front (The Front), about a young woman who wants to go and fight for IS and based on a script by Shalmashi, was shown at NFF 2016.