Dustin Grella

Dustin Grella is an animator and documentary filmmaker whose work attempts to glean glimpses of colorful insight into the seemingly mundane. His work has screened at the Cannes Film Festival, Sundance Film Festival, and won the Walt Disney Award at the Ottawa International Animation Festival. His film "Prayers for Peace" screened at almost two hundred festivals worldwide and won over forty awards. He has written and mailed himself a letter every day for the past eleven years and has over 4250 sealed letters neatly filed and categorized. He is currently in production of the Animation Hotline, a series of micro-animations where he uses crowd-sourced voicemail messages for content.

Grella was raised in the rural community of Medina, Ohio, and now resides in New York City. He received his MFA from the School of Visual Arts, being honored with the Paula H. Rhodes Award for Excellence in Computer Art. His animations' accolades include winning the Walt Disney Award at the prestigious Ottawa International Animation Festival. In early 2010 the Akron Art Museum featured his short film Prayers for Peace in a four-month installation.