Jessica Gorter trained as a documentary director and editor at the Dutch Film and Television Academy in Amsterdam. Since her graduation she has been working as an independent filmmaker. Shortly after the collapse of the Soviet Union she travelled to St. Petersburg. She was gripped by the silent revolution taking place there and has been closely following the development of the country and its inhabitants ever since. This resulted in her first full-length documentary, Piter (2004), which Variety described as “an absorbing look at seven residents of St. Petersburg and their conflicted relationship to both past and future”. In 900 Days (2011) she showed the last survivors of the Leningrad siege struggling with the ghastly reality they were not allowed to mention for so many years and the heroic myth created around it by the authorities. The film has won various awards, including Best Dutch Documentary at IDFA, the Prix Interreligieux at the Vision du Réel Film Festival in Nyon and the Special Jury Award at the Moscow Artdocfest Festival. The Red Soul (2017) is her latest documentary.
In 2014 Jessica was awarded the Documentary Grant from the Prins Bernhard Cultuurfonds for “the skilful and solid way in which she conducts her research and her well-chosen, multi-layered approach of her subject matter.” Her films are frequently shown at festivals and on television in many countries and have been on release in cinemas. She has also worked as a director, camerawoman and editor on documentary programs for Human, VPRO and NTR broadcasting companies in the Netherlands.
