Sareen Hairabedian is an award-winning documentary filmmaker based between the U.S., Armenia and Jordan. She is the founder of HAI Creative, a production company that collaborates with artists and humanitarian organizations across continents. Through her intimate observational shooting style, she captures the untold stories of underrepresented communities. Her subjects range from a modern dancer re-indigenizing his art while learning about his native Hawaiian culture, to Indian women facing extreme challenges of maternal health in Uttar Pradesh, to a rapper’s paradox of the immigrant experience in New York, to America’s most vulnerable, navigating life through the pandemic. Hairabedian’s directorial debut We Are Not Done Yet is a 40-minute HBO documentary about U.S. veterans grappling with PTSD who use art and poetry to heal. It was acclaimed Best Documentary at The G.I. Film Festival and was nominated for Best Documentary Short at the International Documentary Association 2018 Awards. Since 2018, Sareen has been developing her feature documentary based in Artsakh, a recipient of the IDFA Spotlight Award in 2021.

When she’s not making films, Sareen connects to her dance background and explores the connections between choreography and technology.  

The District of Columbia Office of Cable Television, Film, Music, and Entertainment (OCTFME) recognized Sareen Hairabedian as the December 2018 Filmmaker of the Month. https://entertainment.dc.gov/release/fotm-DECEMBER-2018

Sareen@hai-creative.com

Photo by Kurt Heyde