Genevieve Clay-Smith

Genevieve grew up in Newcastle and attended the Hunter School of the Performing Arts located in Broadmeadow. As an active actress in the local children's theatre called the ‘Young People’s Theatre,’ she had her first taste of filmmaking at 10 years of age, when she was cast as Nancy Cakebread in the Australian feature film, 15 Almore (1998).[7] Growing up, Genevieve was nominated for two City of Newcastle Dramatic Art Awards for her performances in Pride and Prejudice and the Canterbury Tales and won the NSW State School Shakespeare Championships with a duologue from The Merchant of Venice.

Genevieve graduated with a Bachelor of Arts (BA) Degree, majoring in Media Arts and Production/ Mass Communication, from the University of Technology Sydney in 2008. Genevieve was then accepted into the Australian Film, Television and Radio School (AFTRS) where she completed her Masters of Screen Arts in 2013. During her time at AFTRS Genevieve was elected as the student representative for council and participated on the board of the school. Genevieve completed her Graduate Certificate in Screenwriting in 2014. She also holds a Certificate IV in small business administration which she received in 2010 from the New Enterprise Investment Scheme.

She is an alumnus of the Foundation for Young Australians, Young Social Pioneers (YSP) program, where she received a 12-month scholarship to be mentored and trained in social entrepreneurship in 2010.

Genevieve developed an interest in representing disability on screen when she was employed to make a feature-length documentary for Down Syndrome New South Wales in 2007, over 18 months she spent time with six people with Down syndrome and their families as she documented their involvement in the Up, Up and Away Project, designed at assisting them to achieve life goals. During this time Genevieve also performed in shows with the Power House Youth Theatre in Fairfield and an all abilities acting ensemble.

In 2009, at the age of 20, Genevieve won the ‘Best Film’ award at Tropfest, with a short film named ‘Be My Brother.’ The film starred a man with Down syndrome and was created with the support of various crew members with disabilities, who worked with and learnt from professional crew members on set. Genevieve focus as a filmmaker has been to make films with, for and about people from marginalised backgrounds to voice their experiences and help drive social change through the power of film.  These include people with intellectual disabilities, people from refugee backgrounds, people living with mental health issues and young people.

Genevieve was the director of Beyond Vision from 2010 – 2011, NSW only blind acting ensemble held at the Power House Youth Theatre in Fairfield.

In 2009 Genevieve co-founded the not for profit organisation Bus Stop Films in response to winning Tropfest with an inclusive film, and she co-founded Taste Creative in 2010.

Through her role as CEO of BSF, Genevieve has been forging pathways for inclusion in the film industry.[8] She has managed, hosted and delivered countless grassroots advocacy events and community screenings of Bus Stop's work. She has campaigned for the need to incorporate more inclusion and diversity on the film screen and within the media, She has forged a partnership between BSF and AFTRS, thereby facilitating Bus Stop's students with intellectual disabilities access to the world-class film, television and radio industries.

Genevieve was a key partner, stakeholder and consultant of the 2017 Screen NSW ScreenAbility initiative – a world first initiative which focused on eight people with disabilities who were given paid internships at some of Australia's top production companies.

Genevieve successfully received an AMP Tomorrow Makers grant[9] in 2016 which enabled her to spend 18 months writing Bus Stop Films’ Accessible Film Studies Curriculum and turning it into an online resource for the purpose of sharing the program with others.

The curriculum includes 17 subjects of study, and various resources that collate Genevieve's filmmaking program into a succinct document designed to help others teach and implement the program. It was developed with the assistance of Robyn Ewing AM and Karen Mutch at the Australian Film Television and Radio School.

As an extension of her work, in 2016, Genevieve was invited by the NSW Minister for the Arts to join the Arts and Culture Advisory Board Committee,[10] to advise the government and help influence policy on matters pertaining to developing and promoting the arts and culture of NSW.  

Genevieve has also been pioneering inclusive filmmaking globally and has given presentations at the BBC Manchester, the Extraordinary Film Festival in Belgium,[11] Walt Disney Animation Studios HQ in Burbank and the Scottish Mental Health Arts and Film Festival. In January 2018, Genevieve finished her first international project in Japan, titled ‘Shakespeare in Tokyo’, which combined a workshop and professional work experience for six Japanese people with Down syndrome.[12] The project was a partnership between BSF, Taste Creative, the Tokyo Metropolitan Government, the Short Shorts film festival and Asia, and the Down Syndrome Japan Society.

Shakespeare in Tokyo was launched at the international film festival Short Shorts Film Festival with the Governor of Tokyo Yuriko Koike.

In March 2018, Genevieve was invited to deliver the closing keynote speech[13] at the Toronto International Film Festival – Kids section, where she presented on BSF and the power of inclusive filmmaking.  

In 2017 Genevieve's work was presented in a one-hour retrospective entitled “the Cinema of Genevieve Clay-Smith” at the Extraordinary Film Festival in Brussels, Belgium. The same year Genevieve was invited by the Committee of Sydney to contribute an essay to the Sydney Culture Essays, in the essay “City of Film, Sydney’s Untapped Potential” Genevieve called for more funding to be invested into grassroots filmmaking initiatives.

Genevieve released her first Children's Book I Didn't Like Hubert in 2018, with all proceeds being donated to the Humpty Dumpty Foundation.[14]

Genevieve is currently a board member of the Monkey Baa Theatre Company and most recently, Genevieve travelled to Mongolia to establish the Bus Stop Films Accessible Film Studies Program in partnership with the Arts Council of Mongolia.

Genevieve Clay-Smith won the award of Young Australian Filmmaker at the 2014 Byron Bay International Film Festival for the film The Interviewer.

In addition to her film industry awards, in recognition of her community work, Genevieve was the 2014 winner of the Australian Financial Review and Westpac 100 Women of Influence Award, where she was recognised as the overall winner in the Young Leader category for her contribution to creating inclusion within the film industry.[15]

In 2015, Genevieve was named the NSW Young Australian of the Year, "I'm so excited to use this award to raise awareness for the things I stand for, to have a platform to advocate for people who are marginalised. You don't understand someone's potential until you give them an opportunity to rise to the occasion."[16]

More recently, in 2017 she was the winner of the Entrepreneurial Award in the B&T 30 under 30 awards.  In the same year, she was awarded the prestigious Sidney Myer Creative Fellowship grant[17] to support her professional work.

In 2018, Genevieve and her husband Henry Smith accepted the Optus My Business Award as Taste Creative won the Media, Marketing & Advertising Business of the Year award.[18]

• Garry Maddox (23 February 2009). "Oh brother: woman in red carries off the Tropfest prize". Sydney Morning Herald.
• Nash, Cara (29 March 2010). "Little Films, Big Ideas". FilmInk. Archived from the original on 10 March 2012.
• Nash, Cara (1 December 2010). "Love and Other Disabilities". FilmInk. Archived from the original on 2 March 2011.
• "Genevieve Clay". Who's Who of Australian Women.

• Genevieve Clay-Smith on IMBD
• Awards for Genevieve Clay-Smith on IMBD