PRESS
“During Oscars week in Los Angeles, the industry gathers to celebrate craft. The Lumen Awards, presented by The Impact Lounge, are built to celebrate something else alongside it — the stories and people who can move culture and inspire action.
Unlike traditional awards that focus mainly on what happens on screen, Lumen looks at the full picture. It honors filmmakers whose work helps us see urgent issues differently, but it also recognizes the people actually working on those issues in the real world.
Now entering its second year, the Lumen Awards are quietly carving out a different kind of space during Hollywood’s biggest week. The room looks familiar — filmmakers, producers, cultural leaders — but the conversation goes a step further. It’s about what happens after a story reaches an audience.
For founder Heather Mason, that idea grew from something she kept noticing while working in media and impact storytelling.
“While there might’ve been films recognized for social good or social change or something positive, the problem is those people doing that work were never in the room,” she said. “It was just about the films. And so ours is about both.””
— Forbes
This ‘Ashes to Films’ Festival Film Honors Pet Owners Who Survived the Altadena Fire
“A year after the Palisades and Altadena fires, the Ashes to Films Festival honored the works of 10 survivors. Over the course of a weekend, attendees could view the films these survivors made. The festival aimed to highlight the hope and resiliency of life after the fires.”
— LA Times
“Ashes to Films’ founder and CEO, Shiloh Strong, previously experienced the devastation of a fire when the Jesusita Fire burned down his home in Santa Barbara in 2009.
“When these [recent] fires happened, I was looking back and remembering what it was like months later. And that’s when it got really difficult, because the rest of the world moves on,” he said. He formed the nonprofit to provide some support to those affected.
With Wednesday’s event, Ashes to Films executive director Alyssa Dudek said she wanted Hollywood workers to envision a brighter future. “We’re hoping this gives people a moment to explore calls to action, to explore how to look at the future,” said.
She added that she hoped the event’s attendees would “be thinking about ways to support a community that desperately needs it and that desperately wants to keep doing what they’re doing.””
— The Hollywood Reporter
“The backers of Ashes to Films aim to harness the idea that creativity and the arts help people heal after intense trauma.
“Ashes to Films exists to prove that hope doesn’t burn; dreams don’t burn — and neither does creativity,” said founder Shiloh Strong…
“Supporting artists in Los Angeles is supporting the city’s future,” [Executive Director Alyssa] Dudek said.”
— Variety
“A group of teenagers who lost their homes in the Palisades and Eaton fires have spent this week telling their own stories of resilience.
Ashes to Films, a new nonprofit film fund and festival, selected 16 fire-affected young filmmakers to participate in a free, week-long workshop in partnership with New York Film Academy’s (NYFA) Los Angeles.
“We're not defined by what we've lost, we're defined by what we create,” said founder Shiloh Strong. “It’s the idea of allowing these kids an opportunity to recover creatively and think of something besides that and pursue their dreams.””
— NBC Los Angeles