Meet the Artist

Johnna Lambert is a filmmaker and artist from the Bronx, NY. She is a creative and passionate storyteller who has always been drawn to unique narratives showcasing the beauty and diversity of Black experiences. As an editor, she works closely with directors to create immersive experiences through film that are thought-provoking and emotionally resonant. 

Vision & Inspiration

Johnna comes from a vibrant household that shapes the lens through which she sees the world and informs the stories she wants to tell. Growing up she didn’t see many people like her represented on screen, so she creates characters, stories, and worlds to inspire and uplift others. She has always been drawn to unique narratives that showcase the beauty and diversity of Black experiences. She loves telling stories in the coming-of-age, Afrofuturism, and fantasy genres. She wants her audiences to immerse themselves in the worlds she creates and experience joy when interacting with her work.

  • In 2021, Johnna earned her Bachelor of Arts in Visual Media Studies and African & African American Studies from Duke University with a minor in Cinematic Arts. At Duke, Johnna began her filmmaking journey, worked as a graphic designer, and wrote her first feature film. She ended her time at Duke creating her thesis The Liberation of 3-829, an afrofuturistic screenplay.

    In 2025, she earned her MFA in Film & TV Production from the USC School of Cinematic Arts, where she has written, directed, and edited several projects, including her thesis film Mezzo. At USC, she expanded her creative range and collaborated with a variety of brilliant filmmakers.

  • As an undergrad, Johnna worked at the Mary Lou Williams Center for Black Culture at Duke University as a Graphic Designer for three years and then as the Programming and Engagement Fellow for a year after her graduation. There she led the social media team, planned and coordinated several events, and collaborating in the production of several promotional campaigns.

    She also spent a summer as a Communications Intern at MemoryCrafters LLC. where she created and distributed a monthly newsletter, collaborated in designing a company website and a prototype for a social networking service in Adobe XD.

    She’s worked as an Executive Office Intern at the Children’s Defense Fund, where part of her responsibilities were to film and edit a documentary capturing the events of a six-city tour and designing an interactive webpage to display the data curated from the tour.

    At USC, Johnna wrote and directed many projects and short films including Sonata (2022), Gold & Russo: Agents of Chaos (2023), and Mezzo (2025). She edited and co-edited several projects including short films Are You Healed Yet (2025), Many Thousands Lost (2024) and M87 (2024). Some of her cinematography credits include Convertible (2023) and Aesthete (2022). Additionally she has taken up several other roles, like script supervisor, DIT, Assistant Editor and G&E, and on countless other USC productions within her cohort.

  • Editing- Premiere Pro, After Effects, Avid Media Composer; DaVinci Resolve; Final Cut Pro

    Writing -Screenwriting; Poetry; Fiction

    Visual Art - Painting, Digital Art, Drawing, Animation, Titles & Motion Graphics

    General - Microsoft Office Suite, Adobe Creative Cloud Suite