The Pare Lorentz Documentary Fund
Please note that for the 2025 grants cycle, the Pare Lorentz Documentary Fund will begin the process to award grantees in the Summer of 2025. In the coming weeks, we will announce this year’s partner organizations and start the nomination process. Please see all IDA funding updates here.
About the Fund
Made possible by the New York Community Trust, the Pare Lorentz Documentary Fund supports feature-length documentary films that reflect the spirit and nature of Pare Lorentz's work, exhibiting objective research, artful storytelling, strong visual style, artistic writing, and outstanding music composition, as well as skillful direction, camerawork, and editing.
The Pare Lorentz Documentary Fund began in 2011, making it the International Documentary Association’s oldest fund, and has granted $1,285,000 to 69 projects. Starting in 2023, the Fund began accepting Immersive Nonfiction projects as part of the Pare Lorentz slate. Now, the Fund accepts applications from all over the world.
The fund provides production and post-production grants to be used in the creation of original, independent documentary films that illuminate urgent issues. Noteworthy Pare Lorentz grantees include Black Mothers, Not Going Quietly, Hummingbirds, After Sherman, and Crip Camp. A complete list of Pare Lorentz grantees can be found in our Grantee Database.
Projects must focus on one or more of Pare Lorentz's central concerns—the appropriate use of the natural environment, justice for all, or the illumination of pressing social problems. Our 2024 theme is Gender Justice and will be part of the IDA open call in May.
Changes to the Fund
In 2022 and 2023, Pare Lorentz temporarily changed its application process to be a nomination selection with select Partner Organizations. Prioritizing collaboration and geographic diversity within the US, the Fund partnered with the below organizations. In 2024, Pare Lorentz will open up once again to public applications.
- Partner Organizations 2023
Partner Organizations 2023
Indie Memphis, at its core, envisions a vibrant global community of filmmakers, both young and adult, bound together by dedicated supporters, with Memphis serving as its beating heart. We are passionately dedicated to cultivating an inclusive and racially equitable independent film community, while actively nurturing the growth and development of filmmakers. Location: Memphis, Tennessee.
The Smithsonian’s Mother Tongue Film Festival celebrates cultural and linguistic diversity by showcasing films and filmmakers from around the world, highlighting the crucial role languages play in our daily lives. Through digital storytelling, the festival amplifies the work of diverse practitioners who explore the power of language to connect the past, present, and future. Location: Washington, DC.
From humble roots as a collective of emerging artists and curators living and working out of a 3-story walk-up in Brooklyn, UnionDocs has become an internationally recognized center for documentary art now headquartered in Ridgewood, Queens. Through presentation, productions, publishing, and educational programming, we bring together a diverse community of artists, dedicated journalists, big thinkers, and local partners on a search for urgent expressions of the human experience, practical perspectives on the world today, and compelling visions for the future. In doing so, we embrace the broad spectrum of documentary approaches and disciplines; from social-issue to experimental, from personal to archival, from essayistic to observational, all impulses towards "creative actuality" are given space and attention. Location: Ridgewood, New York.
- Partner Organizations 2022
Partner Organizations 2022
Recognizing the power of film to inspire, Working Films positions documentaries to increase civic engagement and shift culture at the local, state, and national level. We offer funding and in-kind support to underrepresented filmmakers. And, we share our learning and foster dialogue to further the field of documentary for change. We lead conversations and trainings with grassroots groups and nonprofits to ensure that nonfiction media is increasingly embraced as a critical resource in their strategies for social change. Location: Wilmington, North Carolina.
In the Chicago spirit of collaboration and solidarity, the newly formed Chicago BIPOC Media Coalition -- founded by Sisters in Cinema, Full Spectrum Features, Mezcla Media Collective, and OTV | Open Television -- is launching the Chicago BIPOC Media Fund to support general operations and strategic partnerships as a development & management commons. The Fund leverages the strengths of the Coalition, individually and collectively, to catalyze the most innovative investment towards a new media infrastructure that is representative of our country’s diversity. Location: Chicago, Illinois.
La Asociación de Documentalistas de Puerto Rico (AdocPR)
The Association of Documentalists of Puerto Rico (AdocPR) is a non-profit organization that brings together various generations of documentary filmmakers in the country with the aim of promoting the development of documentary filmmaking and improving our working conditions. We are currently around 40 documentary filmmakers associated with filmmakers, professors, students, and other members related to the work of documentary film. Location: San Juan, Puerto Rico.
La Asociación de Documentalistas de Puerto Rico (AdocPR) es una organización sin fines de lucro que agrupa diversas generaciones de documentalistas del país con el objetivo de promover el desarrollo del cine documental, y mejorar nuestras condiciones de trabajo. Actualmente somos alrededor de 40 documentalistas asociados entre cineastas, profesores y profesoras, estudiantes y otros miembros relacionados al quehacer del cine documental.