Ele­men­tal Pro­duc­tions is a Los-Angeles based ethno­graphic doc­u­men­tary film com­pany ded­i­cated to the pro­duc­tion of films focus­ing on the rela­tion­ship between cul­ture, psy­chol­ogy, and per­sonal expe­ri­ence. Ele­men­tal Pro­duc­tions was founded in 2007 by anthro­pol­o­gist Robert Lemel­son and evolved out of years of field­work and thou­sands of hours of footage gath­ered in Indone­sia since 1997.

Robert Lemelson

Director

Robert Lemelson is a cultural anthropologist, ethnographic filmmaker and philanthropist. Lemelson received his M.A. from the University of Chicago and Ph.D. from the Department of Anthropology at the University of California Los Angeles. Lemelson’s area of specialty is transcultural psychiatry; Southeast Asian Studies, particularly Indonesia; and psychological and medical anthropology.

Lemelson currently is a research anthropologist in the Semel Institute of Neuroscience UCLA, an adjunct professor of Anthropology at UCLA, and a visiting professor at USC. His scholarly work has appeared in numerous journals and books. Lemelson founded Elemental Productions in 2007, a documentary film company. He has directed and produced over a dozen ethnographic films related to culture, psychology and personal experience. He is also the founder and president of the Foundation for Psychocultural Research, which supports research and training in the social and neurosciences.

Annie Tucker

RESEARCHER & WRITER

Annie Tucker is a translator, writer, and educator specializing in contemporary Indonesian culture, literature, arts, and health. After working as a dancer and choreographer in her early twenties, she received her PhD from UCLA’s Department of World Arts and Cultures. Her dissertation addressed the treatment of autism in Java with a particular focus on the therapeutic use of traditional arts and the philosophies of development embedded within them.  She is an adjunct lecturer for UCLA’s Disability Studies minor and a writer for Elemental Productions, an independent ethnographic film company making documentaries about Indonesia. Her translation of Beauty is a Wound has been recognized by a PEN/Heim Translation Award, the World Reader’s Award, and is a New York Times Notable book of 2015.

Chisako Yokoyama

EDITOR

Chisako Yokoyama has worked as an editor and assistant editor on studio motion pictures, independent features and narrative and documentary films. Her credits as editor include the English and Japanese language films “Saki,” “Takamine” and “Goemon” and as first assistant editor, “American Gangster”, “Memoirs of a Geisha”, “Black Hawk Down”, “Gladiator”, and “Good Will Hunting.” She’s worked on ethnographic documentaries “Standing on the Edge of a Thorn”, “Bitter Honey”, and more for Elemental Productions.

ROBERT CHHAING-CARLETON

EDITOR & CAMERA OPERATOR

Visual Anthropologist, Robert Carleton-Chhaing focuses on art, particularly film and music, as a tool for social change. His first documentary film, “From the Heart of Brahma” was about Cambodian classical dancer and LBGTQ activist, Prumsodun Ok. He has worked on multiple documentary shorts with Meta House/E.C.C.C. in Phnom Penh such as short docs on the civil parties to the Khmer Rouge tribunal and as editor for Sao Sopheak’s film about Sou Sotheavy, the only known transgendered survivor of the Khmer Rouge genocide. Most recently he was cinematographer for the Smithsonian funded film by director praCh Ly, Satook. Currently, Carleton is a part time lecturer in visual anthropology at California State University Long Beach and works as a camera operator and editor for the ethnographic film production company, Elemental Productions.

Wing Ko

EDITOR & Camera Operator

Through the course of his career, Wing Ko has collaborated with a who’s who of modern artists, musicians and filmmakers. He worked with Spike Jonze on several music videos and edited the pilot for MTV’s “Jackass,” which Jonze co-created and executive produced. As a founding member of the innovative production company H-Gun, Wing helped create more than 80 music videos for Nine Inch Nails, Soundgarden, Public Enemy and other top bands of the time. For more than 15 years he crewed skateboard videos and traveled the globe with world-renowned installation artist Doug Aiken, working on his films “Eraser,” “Into The Sun” and “Electric Earth.”

Caroline Ouelette

Social Media Manager

Caroline Ouellette manages social media for Elemental Productions, helping to expand the reach of the company’s ethnographic media. She is currently pursuing her M.A. in Clinical Psychology at Pepperdine University, with particular interests in psychological anthropology, visual culture, and art. In addition to her academic work, she is a practicing visual artist. Originally from Omaha, Nebraska, she is a UCLA alum and has lived in Los Angeles for the past eight years.

Emily Wong

Social Media Creator

Emily Wong is an undergraduate student at UCLA majoring in Ethnomusicology, with a double minor in Music Industry and Anthropology. At Elemental Productions, she supports social media strategy and content development, drawing on her interdisciplinary background in music, culture, and media. She plans to pursue a master's degree in Social Anthropology, focusing on music, culture, and disabilities.  

NINIK SUPARTINI

Field Producer & Researcher

Ninik Supartini has assisted Dr. Lemelson in several research projects about community mental health in Java and Bali. Since 2006, Supartini has served as a mental health and psychosocial consultant for international humanitarian organizations working in post-disaster and conflict areas in Indonesia and Myanmar.

Supartini studied English teaching as an undergraduate at the Yogyakarta Teacher Training Institute and lectured in English for more than ten years before turning her interests to community mental health. In 2004, she returned to school at Gadjah Mada University to earn her Masters Degree in Developmental Psychology. Supartini was honored with a Donald J. Cohen Fellowship in 2006 and East West Center Fellowships in 2006 and 2007.