Tamika R. Guishard is a first-generation American born of Kittitian heritage in East New York, Brooklyn. With the mind of a storyteller, heart of a teacher, and soul of a dancer, Tamika taught middle school Social Studies in her native East New York before completing NYU Graduate Film. She believes in the powerful fusion of education and cinema, producing for public school districts, Tribeca Film Institute, Great Minds, and on Leech Lake Reservation in her quest to make “films that help”.
While at RU, Tamika continues the development of the film “D-Days” that was recently selected for a Made in NY/IFP Fellowship under the guise of the producer Adetoro Makinde. Shot, written, directed, produced by and starring black women with global Diasporic appeal, while unpacking social justice issues like PTSD, leukemia and foster care, this forthcoming feature is the adaptation of an African dance theatre show originally performed at UPenn in 2000 and produced by the writer/director, then a college junior.
Recognized by Oscar-qualifying festivals and Hollywood Foreign Press for her narrative shorts as well as featured at Harvard University and SXSWedu for her pedagogical video expertise. Since completing undergrad at University of Pennsylvania, she’s garnered distinctive opportunities to teach through cinema, even serving as a Park Ranger at Manhattan’s African Burial Ground producing webisodes to help launch Ken Burns’ “The National Parks: America’s Best Idea”, with youth from Harlem Children’s Zone. After receiving the inaugural Women Cinematographers Grant from Digital Bolex and being named one of the top production-ready screenplays on Tisch’s annual Purple List, her passion project, “D-Days”, was awarded by New York State Council on the Arts (NYSCA). Tamika’s filmmaking acumen most recently landed her at TIFF – as one of only two non-Canadians selected for Black Women Film! Canada – and IFP Project Forum, with D-DAYS being one of twenty U.S.-based narrative projects featured.
