Recently selected as one of Variety Magazine’s ‘Top 10 Directors to Watch’, Emily Abt is an award-winning filmmaker dedicated to creating both fiction and documentary projects that grapple with current socio-political themes. She is also the founder and President of Pureland Pictures Inc., a Brooklyn based production company that produces commercials, promotional films and independent features. Abt's first film, TAKE IT FROM ME, a documentary about the human impact of welfare reform, aired nationwide on PBS as part of the 2001 season of P.O.V, and has since screened at more than 2000 educational institutions nationwide. In 2004 Abt received her MFA in Film Directing from Columbia University's graduate film school. Abt's thesis film was created when she was awarded a year-long Fulbright fellowship to live in London and collaborate with local Muslim girls.