Tarique Qayumi was born in Afghanistan and came to Canada as a refugee. He attended the School of Creative Writing at UBC and received his MFA from UCLA. Following graduation, he went on to direct the feature Targeting (14) and was the executive producer of Sesame Street for Afghanistan before joining the NSI Corus Diverse TV Director Program. Black Kite (17), which premiered at TIFF, is his newest film. It has won three Leo Awards: Best Writer, Best Direction, and Best Picture. Currently, Tarique is working on his next feature, The Letter, which received the Harold Greenberg Fund for development.
