Digital Storytellers Lab Culminates in Dynamic Showcase of Multimedia Projects

The Jewish Writers Institute, a project of Maimonides Fund, celebrated the culmination of its 2025-26 Digital Storytellers Lab with a public showcase held at the Marlene Meyerson JCC Manhattan. Co-directed by Sarah Lefton and Janine Okmin, the year-long fellowship supports creators developing bold, original Jewish-themed projects for digital platforms. 

The creator showcase featured excerpts from an expansive range of projects across formats including short-form video, podcasts, animation, and digital comics. The work explored Jewish history and cultural memory, contemporary social issues, food and music traditions, reimaginings of Jewish texts, and personal narratives of identity and belonging. Some projects brought lesser-known Jewish experiences—such as Iranian refugee stories or Bukharian culture—into focus, while others used humor to explore modern Jewish life. 

Fellows come from an eclectic mix of professional backgrounds, including filmmakers, journalists, comedians, musicians, academics, and digital content creators. What unites these creators is a shared calling: to amplify and illuminate Jewish perspectives, concerns, and experiences—and to do so in community with other creative professionals, building connections that extend beyond the program itself. 

Many of the featured projects are already live or will soon be accessible online. 

To learn more about the Digital Storytellers Lab and explore these projects, explore these pages.