Orwa Nyrabia is the Artistic Director of the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA), the world’s leading documentary film and new media dedicated festival. Before IDFA, Orwa co-founded Syria’s first independent film festival, DOX BOX, together with Diana El Jeiroudi, and was a producer with credits that include Republic of Sielnce (Diana El Jeiroudi, Venice 2021), Notturno (Gianfranco Rosi, Venice 2020), Silvered Water (Ossama Mohammad and W.
Bedirxan, Cannes 2014), Return to Homs (Talal Derki, IDFA 2013) and Dolls, A Woman from Damascus (Diana El Jeiroudi, IDFA 2007) a.o.
His work was recognized by awards such as the George Polk Award, the HRW Courage in Filmmaking Award, and the Katrin Cartlidge Award, a.o. An actor by training (Gate of the Sun, Yousri Nassrallah, Cannes 2004), he started his film career as 1st assistant of Ossama Mohammad (Sacrifices, Cannes 2002) and worked as a journalist at the same time until he co-founded his first company in Damascus 2002, then followed up as he moved to Cairo and then to Berlin where he co-founded No Nation Films in 2014.