Documentary + Art
Commercial Work
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Vashni Korin
Filmmaker + Artist
vashnikorin@gmail.com
Instagram @vash.ni

Adidas SeriesFilm Director of 4 Doc Episodes
From Band Together 2024

Honoring Black Excellence is an adidas initiative that celebrates the accomplishments of Black individuals, collectives, and culture. 


Director: Vashni Korin
EP: Karely Peréz-Cruz 
Director of Photography: Calvin Blue Jr.Dr. Nikole Roebuck is Grambling State University’s First Female Director of Bands and She’s Determined Not to Be Its Last.




Director: Vashni Korin
EP: Karely Peréz-Cruz 
Director of Photography: Calvin Blue Jr.
Wanda Cooper- Jones is Keeping her Son’s Memory Alive and Helping Young Black Boys Run Freely. 





Filmmaker + Artist CV
Vashni Korin
Director + Writer + Producer
vashnikorin@gmail.com
Instagram @vash.niVashni Korin is a filmmaker and artist who works with time-based media blending auto-ethnography, documentary, fiction and sound. Her practice explores public and private ritual through beauty, symbol and rites of passage with emphasis on feminine power. She earned a BA in Journalism from Xavier University of Louisiana and is best known for her cultural documentary work “You Can’t Stop Spirit”(New Orleans, LA) featured in the New York Times, Peréz Art Museum Miami and New Orleans Film Festival Prospect 5 (2021).  “Negra, Yo Soy Bella” (Puerto Rico) is  a short featured on BET + and screened at film festivals in Latin America and the Caribbean. Other works, such as A Prayer (2022), were shown at The Kitchen and Yerba Buena Center for the Arts.

Korin’s approach incorporates improvisation, working through the subconscious, and collage-layered sound, archival, and visual apparatus. These elements embody a Caribbean aesthetic and landscape that she embraces through her practice. 

By challenging social constructs, Korin seeks to reorder the status quo by placing women at the forefront of history, culture, and politics in her work.

Korin currently practices in New Orleans where she is developing scripted fiction, social justice documentaries and continued ethnographic writings.  




Education
Xavier University of Louisiana B.A. Journalism
Sevilla, España Cross Cultural Exchange
Womens Tennis Scholar 2016




Work2026 No More Jail Death, Film Director, John Legend +Free America

2025 Crowned Feature Documentary, Field Producer, Chicago

2024 Keur Simbara, Producer, Short Film in Senegal.

2023 Negra, Yo Soy Bella  Director  Tribeca Studios, and P&G. Distributed on BET +

2021-2023 Black History in 2 Minutes, Series Producer. Distributed on PBS

2023 The Devil You Know Music Video Aja Monet, 1st AD

2022 Love, Lizzo Documentary Cinematographer. Distributed on HBO MAX 

2021 You Can’t Stop Spirit Short Documentary, Director, Producer. Distributed on NY-Times Op Docs, PBS, POV

2022 Adele Interview Canada, Director. Distributed on Youtube TV

2022 Instagram Black Love Commercial, Director. Distributed on Instagram

2021 Descended From the Promised Land: The Legacy of Black Wall Street, Associate Producer. Distributor Film Festivals

2021 Disrupt & Dismantle: Soledad O'Brien, The Cost of Black Motherhood in Mississippi S1 E6, Assistant Camera. Distributed on BET.






Fellowships2024 Adidas Creators Grant Recipient

2022 Tribeca Studios Queen Collective Director Program

2021 Good Pitch Local Puerto Rico| DocSociety

2019 New Orleans Film Society Emerging Voices

2019 Antenna Platform Grant
Exhibitions
(upcoming) H20 Contemporary Arts Center New Orleans (Rather Than a Power Film)
2026



Awards2021 Reel South Award, You Can’t Stop Spirit 

2021 Best Documentary Short, London Independent Film Festival 

2021 Best Documentary Short, New Orleans Film Festival

2021 You Can’t Stop Spirit, Best Documentary Short, Indie Memphis Film Festival & Audience Award

2021 You Can’t Stop Spirit, Best Documentary Short Nomination, Blackstar Film Festival 



Press
  • Revolt TV Vashni Korin is Reclaiming Her identity and history through the power of Film
  • The Grio, Negra, Yo Soy Bella is a love letter to Afro-Latina Women

  • PBS, Vashni Korin Finds Courage in Herself and Other Baby Dolls


  • Olay Commercial, 2023, Afro-Latina culture is celebrated in Negra, Yo Soy Bella

  • Hyperallergic Film 2021, At Third Horizon Film Festival, Caribbean Films Reflect on Layered Pasts, Presents, and Futures


  • OffBeat Magazine, New Short Documentary Captures The Spirit of the New Orleans Baby Doll Tradition, 2021



             

Last Updated 24.10.31




1. You Can’t Stop Spirit (2021)

NY-Times Op Doc + POV PBS

You Can’t Stop Spirit centers the Baby Doll Mardi Gras masking tradition: a group of self-liberated Black women who created an alternative social space where they are encouraged to be free.
—Festivals & Screenings

Blackstar Film Festival (Best Short Nominee)
New Orleans Film Festival (Best Short Winner)
Indie Memphis F.F.(Best Short Winner)
Caribbean Tales Film Festival (Award)
Camden Film Festival
Prospect 5 x New Orleans Film Festival
Trinidad & Tobago Film Festival
Third Horizon Film Festival
London Independent Film Festival (Best Winner)
True/False Film Festival
Baltimore Black Film Festival
Bushwick Film Festival
Palm Springs Film Festival
New Orleans Black Film Festival
Doc nyc Film Festival (shortlisted Oscars)
New Negress Film Screening Schomburg Harlem


—Museums

Perez Art Museum Miami 2024




2. Negra, Yo Soy Bella (2023)

Negra, Yo Soy Bella is a portrait of Mar Cruz– an Afro-Puerto Rican woman who sources strength, healing and black pride through the tradition of Bomba.


Executive Producers, Tribeca Studios, P&G, Queen Latifah, Loretha Jones

Distributed on BET+

—Festivals & Screenings

Tribeca Film Festival
Blackstar Film Festival
Caribbean Tales Film Festival Toronto
Caribbean Film Festival 
Cuba Caribe Festival
Ojos Caribe: Psycho-Tropics: Belonging Elswhere
Vieques Film Festival
Afrocine Film Festival: Popayánm Colombia
St. John Film Society
Mt. San Antonio College California
Kultura Con: Mexico City
La Plaza de Cultura y Artes Los Angeles
Sundance BlackHouse Panel



A Prayer (2023)

Docu-Fiction installation on affirmations and healing. For Samora Pinderhughes: Grief, The Healing Project— Filmmaker of Video Installation

The Kitchen NYC

Yerba Buena Ars Center, Oakland, CA January 2023


Rather Than A Power (2026)

(upcoming) H20:

 Contemporary Arts Center New Orleans 
2026
RATHER THAN A POWER is a collaborative artwork by filmmaker Vashni Korin, fashion designer Denisio Truitt and writer Kristina Kay Robinson. A reflection of kinship amongst varying lineal lines. Their artistry is bonded by the  port of exchange, waterways and memory.

No More Jail Deaths (2026)

(upcoming) 

a short documentary film with John Legend telling the story of families whose loved-ones have died while in jail and reveals the harm and impact jails have on our communities and our nation. 


© Cargo Test Site 2027