Yuka Sakano is head of international relations for the Kawakita Memorial Film Institute in Tokyo. In this role, Sakano manages the liaison between international film festivals including Cannes, Berlin, Venice, Locarno, Montreal, Hong Kong, Busan and Japanese filmmakers, companies and industry since 1998.
As the Kawakita Memorial Film Institute houses an extensive collection of film archives and serves as the foremost resource on Japanese film, Sakano also co-operates with archival and cultural organisations around the world in preparing Japanese film retrospectives.
She has served on international film festival juries in Singapore, Hawaii, Karlovy Vary and others, and has been a member of the APSA International Nominations Council and been a member of the Asia Pacific Screen Academy since 2009.
The Asia Pacific Screen Academy expresses its respect for and acknowledgement of the South East Queensland Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities. We pay our respects to the Traditional Owners of country, including the custodial communities on whose land works are created and celebrated by the Asia Pacific Screen Awards. We acknowledge the continuing connection to land, waters and communities. We also pay our respects to Elders, past and emerging. We recognise the integral role Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander and First Nations peoples continue to play in storytelling and celebration spaces.