Paulina Abarca-Cantin
- Actress
- Producer
- Director
Paulina's career has evolved on stages and screens, spanning content creation, business affairs, communications, policy, programming, production, post-production and distribution, primarily within Canada's English and French-language creative industries.
As a programming specialist, she has developed, curated and promoted award-winning projects, programs and events reporting to public and private stakeholders. As an executive director, she has served non-profit organizations across sectors.
During her tenure as Programming and Operations Lead of the Encore+ YouTube channel created by the Canada Media Fund in unprecedented collaboration with industry partners from 2017-2022, Paulina oversaw the licensing, digitization and promotion of 3000+ classic Canadian feature films, documentaries, television series and short films. In 2020, she launched and executive produced Encore+ Originals featuring A-list Canadian talent revisiting famed past collaborations, recorded via Zoom during the pandemic and leveraging YouTube Premiere. Encore+ and its French-language sister channel Encore Plus, fostered discoverability for legacy content and talent, stimulating sales, remakes and engagement with global audiences, festivals, streaming platforms and Canadians from coast to coast to coast.
Passionate about the preservation of Canadian and Indigenous audiovisual heritage, over 2018-2022 Paulina commissioned and oversaw 2K and 4K restorations of over a dozen endangered classic Canadian feature films for Encore+ in a partnership with Telefilm Canada.
Deepening her knowledge of film preservation practices, she served as Programming Specialist at the Canadian Film Institute's Save As Symposium: The Future of Restoring, Preserving, Distributing, and Exhibiting Heritage Cinema presented at the International Film Festival in Ottawa (IFFO) in 2024, 2023 and in 2022. Here, she programmed and hosted bilingual case studies of recent Canadian legacy film restorations, creating original video interviews with leading talent.
Other national curatorial digital programs under her lead include First Person Digital (National Film Board of Canada / Ada X) and HTMles 2010: Festival of Media Art + Digital Culture (Ada X).
Founder and executive producer of Women in Film and Television International's Short Film Showcase, Paulina curated three editions of the Showcase, presented in twenty cities across three continents. Featuring award-winning short films directed by women from all continents and advocating for gender equity in the global film industry, the Showcase proved highly popular with audiences and at connecting WIFT Chapters across the network.
Active in industry building, Paulina served as Vice-President, Programming and later as President of Montreal Women in Film and Television (Allia - Alliance des femmes des industries créatives) over ten years. Serving as Chair, Global Programming for Women in Film and Television International (WIFTI) over two years, she deepened her knowledge of governance practices, fostering impactful international collaborations. She is co-founding board member and past chair of the advisory committee of the English Language Arts Network (ELAN) and past vice president of the Quebec Drama Federation.
As a programming specialist, she has developed, curated and promoted award-winning projects, programs and events reporting to public and private stakeholders. As an executive director, she has served non-profit organizations across sectors.
During her tenure as Programming and Operations Lead of the Encore+ YouTube channel created by the Canada Media Fund in unprecedented collaboration with industry partners from 2017-2022, Paulina oversaw the licensing, digitization and promotion of 3000+ classic Canadian feature films, documentaries, television series and short films. In 2020, she launched and executive produced Encore+ Originals featuring A-list Canadian talent revisiting famed past collaborations, recorded via Zoom during the pandemic and leveraging YouTube Premiere. Encore+ and its French-language sister channel Encore Plus, fostered discoverability for legacy content and talent, stimulating sales, remakes and engagement with global audiences, festivals, streaming platforms and Canadians from coast to coast to coast.
Passionate about the preservation of Canadian and Indigenous audiovisual heritage, over 2018-2022 Paulina commissioned and oversaw 2K and 4K restorations of over a dozen endangered classic Canadian feature films for Encore+ in a partnership with Telefilm Canada.
Deepening her knowledge of film preservation practices, she served as Programming Specialist at the Canadian Film Institute's Save As Symposium: The Future of Restoring, Preserving, Distributing, and Exhibiting Heritage Cinema presented at the International Film Festival in Ottawa (IFFO) in 2024, 2023 and in 2022. Here, she programmed and hosted bilingual case studies of recent Canadian legacy film restorations, creating original video interviews with leading talent.
Other national curatorial digital programs under her lead include First Person Digital (National Film Board of Canada / Ada X) and HTMles 2010: Festival of Media Art + Digital Culture (Ada X).
Founder and executive producer of Women in Film and Television International's Short Film Showcase, Paulina curated three editions of the Showcase, presented in twenty cities across three continents. Featuring award-winning short films directed by women from all continents and advocating for gender equity in the global film industry, the Showcase proved highly popular with audiences and at connecting WIFT Chapters across the network.
Active in industry building, Paulina served as Vice-President, Programming and later as President of Montreal Women in Film and Television (Allia - Alliance des femmes des industries créatives) over ten years. Serving as Chair, Global Programming for Women in Film and Television International (WIFTI) over two years, she deepened her knowledge of governance practices, fostering impactful international collaborations. She is co-founding board member and past chair of the advisory committee of the English Language Arts Network (ELAN) and past vice president of the Quebec Drama Federation.
