GOOD TALK WITH DAWN MIKKELSON

Multi-Emmy Award winning director/producer/editor and story consultant. 2010 McKnight Filmmaking Fellow, Dawn Mikkelson’s work has broadcast and screened internationally. Festival screenings include: DOC NYC, Cucalorus, Mill Valley Film Festival, Heartland International Film Festival, Sound Unseen, and Hot Springs Documentary Film Festival. Mikkelson has completed seven award-winning independent feature documentaries, the most recent are MINNESOTA MEAN and FINDING HER BEAT, two follow-documentaries celebrating powerful women.

A former television news reporter at an ABC affiliate, Mikkelson has taught Documentary Film as Adjunct Faculty at Ottawa University in Kansas, as well as at Film North. Most recently she served as Broadcast Content Manager at WDSE|WRPT in Duluth, MN. Over her time at WDSE the station and it’s productions quadrupled their Regional Emmy Award Nominations and received national acclaim by NAJA (Native American Journalist Association).

Based in Lake City, Minnesota, Mikkelson is a proud member of the Film Fatales and the DPA (Documentary Producers Alliance), as Co-Representative of the Midwest Region and Member of the Ethics Committee.

Expertise
I've been directing documentary films for over 20 years and have served as a teacher and mentor in the subject. As for the topic of my film, I can speak about the filmmaking process, as well as collaborating with historically underrepresented communities in film. This film has a largely Asian and female/nonbinary crew to create an intimate production that reflected the drummers of FINDING HER BEAT. This intimacy with the subject matter results in both unprecedented access and authenticity to this film. The importance of "voice", who is telling the story is something I can speak about at length as a white cis-gender bi-sexual woman from a small midwestern town who often collaborates with BIPOC and other underrepresented communities. I'm also involved in conversations around ethics in filmmaking as a member of the Ethics Committee of the DPA (Documentary Producers Association).