The Golden Globes Impact Prize for Documentary in Partnership with Artemis Rising Foundation, has been awarded to Letters from the Silenced Country, directed by Andrei Kutsila. The prize is presented as a Collateral Impact Award of the 83rd Venice International Film Festival.

Voting on the award were jury members Helen Hoehne (president, Golden Globes), Regina K. Scully (founder-CEO, Artemis Rising Foundation), Geralyn White Dreyfous (producer and co-founder of Impact Partners), Danielle Turkov Wilson (CEO-founder of Think-Film Impact Production) and Liza Soberano (actress, Forgotten Island; Save the Children Philippines Ambassador). They selected Letters for its courageous storytelling, deeply human perspective, and striking visual artistry.

With the film, Belarusian filmmaker Andrei Kutsila, portrays contemporary Belarus through five individuals whose lives have been upended by state violence and political repression. Built around personal letters written from prison, exile, and underground life, the film combines observational documentary, archival footage, and animation based on drawings created in confinement. Rather than a broad political overview, the film focuses on individual stories of protest, imprisonment, escape, and everyday resistance.

“Letters from the Silenced Country puts a human face on a crisis too often reduced to headlines and numbers, illustrating the impossible choices people make to hold on to their humanity,” the jury said, in announcing their choice. “Though it is rooted in Belarus, its story reaches far beyond one country’s borders, it speaks to anyone who has ever loved someone from a distance, or fought to stay connected to who they are under pressure to disappear. The way the director blends letters, drawings, and memory into the storytelling captures not only grief, but love, hope, and tenderness — the full range of what it means to remain human. It’s a powerful example of how a documentary can show how the most personal stories can also be the most universal.”

The jury collectively added, “This year, the number and calibre of documentaries at the festival marks a clear sign of how much this form of storytelling has grown in mainstream visibility and importance. We hope this momentum continues: more financing opportunities, more festivals and awards giving documentaries recognition, and more room for storytelling that has the power to change how we see the world.”

The Golden Globes Impact Prize for Documentary in Partnership with Artemis Rising Foundation, honors a documentary feature film in the Biennale’s official selection, either in or out of competition, that is calling attention to a key social issue with journalistic and creative prowess. It is a continuation of the partners’ commitment to elevating documentary film, with effects that go beyond the scope of the festival. The winner will receive a cash prize of $10,000 USD from Artemis Rising Foundation.

The Golden Globes, Artemis Rising Foundation, and ThinkFilm Impact Production first partnered to launch a documentary prize at the Cannes Film Festival in 2025, where a jury honored Eugene Jarecki for his contribution to documentaries. Jarecki’s Cannes-premiering film on Julian Assange, The Six Billion Dollar Man  went on to win the L’Oeil d’or Special Jury Prize. The partnership expanded to Venice later that year, where a jury awarded the prize to Ross McElwee’s Remake. Most recently, the prize returned to Cannes in 2026, where a jury honored Joshua Tickell and Rebecca Harrell Tickell for Groundswell, the third film in their environmental trilogy following Kiss the Ground and Common Ground. That jury also awarded a special mention to Pegah Ahangarani for Rehearsals for a Revolution, soon to be released by Sony Pictures Classics. The prize’s presence at Venice builds on ThinkFilm’s established impact work at the festival, where, prior to the partnership, it inaugurated a collateral Impact Award honoring a film in the festival’s official competition selection for its social impact potential.

As a premier entertainment awards show since 1944, the annual Golden Globes has honored achievements in both television and film. Over the last three decades, the Golden Globes has enabled donations of more than $55 million to entertainment-related charities including scholarship programs, film restoration projects and humanitarian efforts. This funding has also supported diverse programs in partnership with advocacy groups aimed at promoting greater access in Hollywood for underserved communities. Dick Clark Productions is the owner and producer of the Golden Globes. For more information on the Golden Globes, please visit GoldenGlobes.com and follow them on X, Instagram, Facebook, Threads and TikTok.

Artemis Rising Foundation is dedicated to supporting media, arts and education projects that transform our culture. Led by Founder-CEO Regina K. Scully, the foundation champions stories about some of the most important issues of our time, including, regenerative farming, mental health and well-being, trauma healing, addiction recovery, women’s empowerment and the regeneration of our planet. Artemis Rising Foundation has helped produce some of the most impactful documentary films of our time, inspiring meaningful changes in education, legislation, corporate policies, cultural and societal norms.

Artemis Rising Foundation works closely with renowned  filmmakers and journalists, including Morgan Neville, Katie Couric, Dawn Porter, Ross Kauffman, Liz Garbus, Amy Ziering, Josh and Rebecca Tickell, John Chester, Louie Schwartzberg, Lana Wilson, Freida Mock, Laura Dern and Alex Gibney, among others. Artemis Rising Foundation has supported hundreds of films, many of which have received Peabody Awards. In addition to documentaries, Artemis Rising Foundation supports a variety of projects that include narrative film, television, theatre, education curricula, and social outreach programs. You can find the Foundation on Instagram here and the Foundation film website here.

Think-Film Impact Productions is the world’s premier impact media company. It partners with international independent feature storytellers to advance social justice at the highest levels of international policy and governance. Think-Film has brought impact into the A-list film festival circuit including co-launching the Cannes Marche du Film impACT program in 2021 and awarding the Venice Collateral Impact Award in 2023 and 2024, with jury members including Chiwetel Ejiofor, Alia Shawkat, Adjoa Andoh, Nadine Labaki, Yalitza Aparicio, Elsa Zylberstein. Think-Film has led impact on more than 50 films over the past 10 years, including: Navalny (2023 Academy Award and BAFTA winner), and Black Box Diaries (2025 Peabody winner, BAFTA and Academy Award nominee). Think-Film co-Produced FACING WAR, a documentary following the final years of former NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, which made history in 2025 as the first non-Danish film to open CPH:DOX.