GOOD TALK WITH VIOLET DU FENG
Director and Producer of HIDDEN LETTERS, Producer of PLEASE REMEMBER ME
Director and Producer of THE DATING GAME
Violet Du Feng is an Emmy and Peabody-winning independent documentarian, a 2025 Guggenheim Fellow, and a 2024 Chicken and Egg Awardee. She is a member of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences and an adjunct professor at the Journalism School of Columbia University. Violet directed and produced THE DATING GAME, which premiered at 2025 Sundance Film Festival World Cinema Competition and won the Best International Director at Doc Edge Film Festival. The film has been widely acclaimed throughout over 20 film festivals around the world. She directed and produced the 2023 Oscar Shortlisted, Peabody and Emmy nominated HIDDEN LETTERS which premiered in competition at the 2022 Tribeca Film Festival, followed by twelve international festival awards and broadcast distributions in more than 15 countries. She directed PBS/CPB special program Harbor from the Holocaust with music performed by Yo-Yo Ma.
She has directed, produced, and executive produced 13 documentaries. Her producing credits include Night of Night (2024), which premiered in competition at CPH:DOX; Dear Mother, I Meant to Write About Death (2022), which received a Special Mention at Busan International Film Festival; Singing in the Wilderness (2021), a nominee for the Golden Alexander Award at Thessaloniki International Film Festival; Confucian Dream (2019), winner of a Special Jury Award at Karlovy Vary International Festival and the Chinese Academy Award of Documentary Film; Mainland (2017), winner of a Special Jury Award at SXSW and PLEASE REMEMBER ME (2015), winner of three awards at GZDocs with a successful theatrical release and impact campaign in China that resulted in policy changes. The film was awarded DocImpactHi5 of 2019.
Violet started her career as a co-producer on the critically acclaimed 2007 Sundance Special Jury winner Peabody and Emmy winner Nanking, which was distributed theatrically around 30 countries throughout the world, and was the highest-grossing documentary in China. Violet produces the forthcoming film Running With the Prime Minister. Violet has served as advisor for Sundance Non-Fiction Producing Lab, HotDocs Blue Ice Docs Fund and Chicken and Egg (Egg)ccelerated Lab. She is a consulting programmer for Shanghai International Film Festival. Born in Shanghai and based in New York, Violet holds a bachelor’s degree in journalism from Fudan University and received her MFA in journalism from the University of California at Berkeley.
Speaking History
Schools I've talked to: UC Berkeley, UCLA, Stanford, NYU, Cornell College, Hong Kong University, Oxford University, University of Iowa, University of Colorado, Rowan University and many more.
I've presented my films at UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, NCORE Educational Conference, International Documentary Association, Asia Society, China Institute, National Committee on US-China Relations. I have also been on NPR, ABCNews, iRadio, PBS to talk about my films.
Expertise
I am an experienced educator, currently an adjunct professor at Columbia University, and I have also taught at the School of Visual Arts in New York. While many of my films explore subjects rooted in China, they resonate globally and often spark meaningful conversations with audiences unfamiliar with the country. Having spent the first half of my life in China and the second in the United States, I bring both an insider’s insight and an outsider’s perspective. In addition to being a documentary filmmaker, I remain a journalist at heart, dedicating hours each day to researching China-related issues. Through my talks, I aim to challenge stereotypes and build understanding, engaging with themes of gender, human relationships, and contemporary Chinese identity.