Clare Stewart is an Australian film festival director. She was appointed the festival director of the Sydney Film Festival (SFF) in 2007. In 2008, SFF introduced an international Official Competition for films that are 'courageous, audacious and cutting-edge' which was won by ''Heartbeats'' in 2010, ''Bronson'' in 2009 and ''Hunger'' in 2008. In 2011 she was appointed by the

British Film Institute The British Film Institute (BFI) is a film and television charitable organisation which promotes and preserves film-making and television in the United Kingdom. The BFI uses funds provided by the National Lottery to encourage film production, ...

(BFI) to run the

BFI London Film Festival The BFI London Film Festival is an annual film festival founded in 1957 and held in the United Kingdom, running for two weeks in October with co-operation from the British Film Institute. It screens more than 300 films, documentaries and shor ...

. She ran the festival successfully transforming its reputation internationally and making LFF an important festival in the awards calendar. She decided after a sabbatical year to leave the post which will be filled by the interim artistic director from December 2018. Stewart was previously Head of Film Programs at the

Australian Centre for the Moving Image ACMI, formerly the Australian Centre for the Moving Image, is Australia's national museum of film, television, videogames, and art. ACMI was established in 2002 and is based at Federation Square in Melbourne, Victoria. During the 2014-15 finan ...

(VIC) where she was responsible for the creative direction of ACMI Cinemas, ACMI’s festival and event partnerships and corporate events business. She was the first Australian producer of Resfest and was Creative Director of ARTV, a joint commissioning project between ACMI and SBS. Previously Clare programmed for the Australian Film Institute for five years and the Melbourne Cinémathèque for seven years. Stewart has lectured in Cinema Studies at

RMIT University RMIT University, officially the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology,, section 4(b) is a public research university in Melbourne Melbourne ( ; Boonwurrung/Woiwurrung: ''Narrm'' or ''Naarm'') is the capital and most populous city ...

. As a broadcaster and critic, Clare has reviewed film for radio ABC 774 and

3AK 3AK is the call sign of SEN 1116, an earlier the on-air name of a former Melbourne talk-back radio and music station, which, in 2003, leased its licence to sports network SEN 1116. A number of unusual events and precedents throughout the stati ...

as well as presented Filmbuffs Forecast program for radio

3RRR 3RRR (pronounced "Three Triple R", or simply "Triple R") is an Australian community radio station, based in Melbourne. 3RRR first commenced broadcasting in 1976 from the studios of 3ST, the student radio station of the Royal Melbourne Institut ...

. Clare is the establishing editor of Cteq, a journal dedicated to film criticism, now published as part of online journal ''

Senses of Cinema ''Senses of Cinema'' is a quarterly online film magazine founded in 1999 by filmmaker Bill Mousoulis. Based in Melbourne, Australia, ''Senses of Cinema'' publishes work by film critics from all over the world, including critical essays, career ...

''. She was a recipient of the Queen's Trust Award for Young Australians and is a past committee member of the Australian Youth Foundation.

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See also