Gretchen Stoeltje

Gretchen Stoeltje creates documentaries and features confronting issues of female power and identity. Most recently she finished Bionic Beauty Salon, a short chronicle of fact and fiction about the female body.  Previous works include the 1994 collaboration with Jeanne C. Finley, A.R.M. Around Moscow, which documents an American/Russian dating service pairing American men with Russian women; and from 1991, Venom in a Jar, A Kiss from the Queen, which questions the role of Miss Snake Charmer, the teenage beauty queen chosen to accompany the Sweetwater, Texas Jaycees in their annual Rattlesnake Round-up. She holds a law degree from Santa Clara University (2004) where she studied intellectual property with a focus on the rights of artists and filmmakers.