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SUCCESS HAS MANY FATHERS AND MOTHERS

We are environmentalists and filmmakers who want to share the story of one of the greatest environmental successes of the century, the preservation of a gray whale nursery threatened by a giant industrial salt works.

Over the last two years, the The Whale Lagoon Project has been filming the recollections and insights from the constellation of characters from Mexico, the U.S., and Japan involved in the fight to save the lagoon – the local fishermen and their families, poets and politicians, scientists and celebrities, activists and journalists.

OUR TEAM

Director, Cinematographer

Francisco Campos-Lopez
Director, Cinematographer

Jacob Scherr

Jacob Scherr
Producer

Clate Korsant

Clate Korsant
Producer

Valeria Gelman

Valeria Gelman
Associate Producer

Raul Lopez

Raúl López
Associate Producer

Magen Entertainment is the production company for Who Saved the Whale Lagoon, which is a Project of The Ocean Foundation. The International Community Foundation is also receiving and administering charitable gifts for our documentation of Laguna San Ignacio. Both Foundations are 501(c)3 organizations.

Advisors

We have been so encouraged by the support and engagement of our family, friends, colleagues, and many others who are part of the story of Who Saved Laguna San Ignacio. We are eager to grow our “core audience” of those who share our passion for this place and its people and our desire to share this story of environmental success.

Many have already given generously of their talents and time and recollections and insights to move us forward with the production of the feature film and the further development of the documentary project. We thank you all.

Mexico

Homero Aridjis and Betty Ferber | Grupo de Los Cien – Authors, News of the Earth (2017)

Julia Carrabias | Former Minister of the Environment, Mexico

Alejandra Navarete | Government and Multinationals Liaison Officer, Ocean Foundation

Andrés Rosental | Former Deputy Foreign Minister of Mexico

US and International

Paloma Aguirre | Senior Program Officer for the Environment, International Community Foundation

Mary Ann Beyster | Documentary Filmmaker and Impact Producer

Jared Blumenfeld | Secretary of the Environment, State of California – Jared’s biweekly podcast is Podship Earth

Serge Dedina, Wildcoast and Mayor, Imperial Beach, CA – Author, Saving the Gray Whale: People, Politics, and Conservation in Baja California (2000)

Tetsuo Jimbo | CEO, Videonews.com

Larry Kopald

Amanda Maxwell | Director, Latin American Program, Natural Resources Defense Council

Anne McEnany | Senior Program Officer, Alumbra Innovations Foundation

Angie Mulder, Baja Discovery

Marisa Quiroz | President and CEO, International Community Foundation – ICF’s blog on Gray Whales in the Baja Peninsula

Patrick Ramage | Director, Outreach and Program Collaboration, International Fund for Animal Welfare 

Joel Reynolds | Western Director, Natural Resources Defense Council – Joel’s blog marking the 20th Anniversary of the Victory over the Saltworks

Marcie Rothman

Dick Russell | Writer – Author, Eye of the Whale: Epic Passage from Baja to Siberia (2001)

Mark Spalding | President, The Ocean Foundation – Mark’s paper for Justice in Mexico: Mobilizing Across Borders: The Case of the Laguna San Ignacio Saltworks Project.

Emily Young | Exec. Dir., The NonProfit Institute, University of San Diego

Scientists

Dr. Roger Payne | Founder and President of the Ocean Alliance – Ocean Alliance overview of Dr. Payne’s engagement and statements on the campaign to stop the saltworks.

Dr. Steven Swartz |Co-Director and Founder, Laguna San Ignacio Ecosystem Science Program – Author, Lagoon Time: Our Life and Times Among the Gray Whales of Laguna San Ignacio (2014)

Mary Lou Jones | Researcher, Laguna San Ignacio Ecosystem Science Program

Artists

Pierce Brosnan and Keely Smith Brosnan

Elizabeth Coleman Author and Editor – Editor, Here: Poems for the Planet (2019)

Wendy Larsen, Poet and Josie Merck, Painter – Authors, The Gray Whales of Baja (2012)

Richard Sobol, Photographer – Author, Adelina’s Whales (2003)

Supporters

We are so grateful for the financial support that we have received from our family and friends and all of you. Your charitable contributions have enabled us to make great progress in documenting Laguna San Ignacio in spite of the pandemic. With your help, we can make a film that will have a real impact in Baja California and around the world. It is a story of environmental success at at time our planet really needs one.

Mother Whales ($50,000+)

 

Friendly Whales ($20,000+) 

  • Elizabeth Armstrong
  • Josephine A. Merck
  • Caroline Steifel
 
 

Breaching Whales ($10,000+)

  • Russell and Carole Faucett
  • Russell and Sara Foszcz
  • The David & Heidi Welch Foundation
 
 

Spyhoping Whales($5,000+)

  • Elizabeth Barratt-Brown
  • Mary Ann Beyster
  • Jared Blumenfeld
  • Beatrice R & Joseph A Coleman Foundation
  • Doug Hammer & Patricia Dunham
  • Larry Kopald & Andrea Nelson
  • Marcie Rothman
  • Wiatt Family Fund
  • Ira Ziering
 

Migrating Whales ($1,000+)

  • Clover Bergmann
  • Jonathan & Lindsay Scherr Burgess
  • Erik Eckholm
  • Jeff & Ursula Foszcz 
  • Sheira Freedman
  • Keifer & Bill Irwin
  • Eric Kentor
  • Susan Levine & James Lauer
  • Lawrie Mott
  • Angela Mulder
  • Adam & Marlyse Scherr
  • Barry Scherr
  • Jacob & Carole Dickert Scherr
  • Thomas & Cathryn Scoville
  • Nancy Tartt
 

Gray Whales

  • Joshua Barrett & Julie Adams
  • Beto Bedolfe
  • Burkey & Donna Greenfield Belser
  • Susan Buffone
  • Carole Feld
  • Peggy Hubble
  • Gerben Hoeksma
  • Susan Lightcap
  • Steve Mills
  • Luanne Rice
  • Patricia Sullivan
  • Ron Ullrich
  • Barbara VanHanken
  • David Williams
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Francisco campos-lópez

Director, Cinematographer
President, Magen Entertainment

Franco is a Chilean-born film director, producer and writer. He began his film studies and career in Argentina. Franco’s work has taken him around the world, and he has taught master classes in China and Israel.

He has made films about conservation in Patagonia, the Amazon, and the Andes. Franco moved to the US in 2009. His most recent feature film was “I Did Her Wrong”. His company Magen Entertainment is producing the films for the “Who Saved the Whale Lagoon” project.

magen
Jacob Scherr

Producer

Jacob was an attorney and program director with the Natural Resources Defense Council in Washington, DC for almost four decades until his retirement in 2014. Jacob initiated and co-lead NRDC’s campaign to save Laguna San Ignacio. He led NRDC’s BioGem Initiative that coordinated campaigns to save special natural places under threat throughout the Americas.

Jacob produced NRDC’s first nationally-televised program – one with Carl Sagan on Nuclear Winter – in 1984. In 1986, he produced a well-received video “Troika: Journey to Forbidden Places” on a “military glasnost” trip to the Soviet Union where the NRDC team was given unprecedented access to sensitive Soviet military facilities. Mr. Scherr hired NRDC’s first Communications Director in late 1980s and was among the leaders at NRDC in employing images and video as an element of the organization’s advocacy.

Jacob is also a member of the Boards of the Environmental Film Festival in the Nation’s Capital and the Hollomon Price Foundation. He also serves on NRDC’s Global Leadership Council and on the Rose-Walter Prize selection committee at Dickinson College.

Clate Korsant

Producer

A New York City-based cultural anthropologist, Clate currently teaches at John Jay College of Criminal Justice and holds a PhD from Goldsmiths, University of London. He has taught anthropology courses at Goldsmiths and Bard College’s Bard Prison Initiative. His dissertation, Environmentalisms in Practice: From National Policy to Grassroots Activism in Costa Rica’s Osa Peninsula (2018), became the premise for the ethnographic documentary, Lifting the Green Screen (Tras el Velo Verde). In particular, Clate has developed scholarship at the intersection of political ecology, environmental theory, socio-political justice, and conservation.

With a lifelong interest in visual and performing arts, Clate has completed courses at the New York Film Academy and Santa Fe Photographic Workshops. From landscape and travel photography to writing and performing on stage, he has recognized storytelling to be a compelling vehicle for creative expression. Especially at the critical confluence of environmental health and socio-political justice, visual narrative and ethnographic storytelling become vital.

Valeria Gelman

Associate Producer

Valeria is a Russian-born producer and environmentalist. She moved to the US in college, and since then has been working on bringing attention to social and environmental issues throughout the world.

Valeria brings her production and management skills from working on projects for the World Resources Institute, Voice of America (VOA) and Viva Creative. The VOA documentary series she worked on received a Telly Award in 2018. Fluent in Russian, Spanish and English, she has traveled all over the world for work and personal growth. While dedicated to storytelling for impact, her background is in ecology, urban planning and international development.

Raúl López

Associate Producer

Raúl López moved to Laguna San Ignacio in the early 1980s, and since then has become a prominent member of the community and leader in local conservation efforts.

Raúl is the founding partner of Ecoturismo Kuyimá (whale watching outfitter) and is currently the treasurer of the board of directors. He is also the first president of the board of directors of Laguna Baja Rural Association of Collective Interest, an organization that brings together providers of tourist services to guarantee safety and quality service to all visitors to Laguna San Ignacio. Previously, Raúl was an inspector and advisor to the Advisory Council of the El Vizcaíno Biosphere Reserve, as well as the coordinator of the ecological easements in private plots and lands of common use of the Ejido Luis Echeverría in Laguna San Ignacio.