“The Observer & The Observed” won two national ECCO Awards including the overall People’s Choice Award.  The feature-length documentary by Brad Bryan follows four families and 16 artists who participated in a community project by the same name.  The project (including the film) won two awards at the national conference of SAMHSA (the federal Substance Abuse & Mental Health Services Administration). It won a Silver ECCO (Excellence in Community Communication & Outreach) Award and the overall People’s Choice Award in the Partnership Development category.

Anne Ferrier, project leader and film producer who appears throughout the documentary, traveled to Washington DC to accept the award on behalf of Sarasota’s Partnership for Children’s Mental Health.  The Partnership is funded by SAMHSA, and part of this funding supported the “Observer…” cultural and linguistic competence project and the documentary film created about it.