Yi Chen

Yi Chen is an Academy Award-qualifying documentary filmmaker based in Washington, DC. Yi’s current project Democracy in Exile (WT) was selected for 2025 DOK Leipzig Co-Pro Market in Germany and an international grant from Taiwan Foundation for Democracy. As an immigrant from an authoritarian country, her films explore the intersection of democracy, identity, and migration. FIRST VOTE uncovers why voters from China with authoritarian tendencies have supported Trump since 2016. The film qualified for the 93rd Academy Awards in the Best Picture and Best Documentary Feature categories. It was broadcast on PBS stations nationally and had a theatrical release at AFI Silver Theater, Carolina Theatre, and Nightlight Cinema. FIRST VOTE also won Telly Awards and Special Jury Award for Art & Craft of Documentary Form at the 36th LA Asian Pacific Film Festival. DISSIDENTS had its international premiere at 2024 Doc Edge Festival in New Zealand and won Best Documentary Feature at the DC Independent Film Festival. The film investigates how three exiled Chinese democracy activists in the U.S. are targeted by transnational repression. Java Films acquired the film after its European Film Market premiere at Berlinale. Yi was the line producer for director Tsai Ming-liang’s US-Taiwan co-production ABIDING NOWHERE. The film premiered at 2024 Berlinale and screened at festivals including CPH: DOX, Viennale, Tokyo FILMeX, BFI London Film Festival, and Melbourne International Film Festival.

Yi has received grants from ITVS, Ford Foundation, Open Society Foundations, CAAM, Human Rights Foundation, New York Foundation for the Arts, Kartemquin Films, DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities, and Southern Documentary Fund. She has presented her projects at IDFA Docs for Sale, Hot Docs Doc Shop, AFI DOCS, DOC NYC Pitch Perfect, Tribeca IF/Then, IDA DocuClub, Double Exposure Investigative Film Festival, and DC/DOX. Her work has been featured in NBC News, Washington Post, BBC News, NPR, Salon, Indie Wire, Politico, and Documentary Magazine. Yi holds an MFA in Film and Media Arts from American University and has taught documentary history, production, and editing at University of Colorado Boulder and George Mason University as an adjunct professor.