About Me

Maleah Welsh is a Santa Cruz-based documentary filmmaker, photographer, and social justice activist. Working in both analog and digital media, she first discovered her love for image-making in the darkroom—a tactile and meditative process that continues to shape her visual approach. Her background in photography informs a filmmaking practice rooted in careful composition, texture, and visual intimacy.

Maleah’s current work centers on the stories of unhoused women, exploring the layered experiences of displacement, resilience, and belonging. She weaves poetry, sound, and other artistic modalities into her films to evoke emotion and reflect the complexity of her subjects’ inner worlds. Guided by a deep belief in the power of storytelling, she seeks not only to challenge prevailing narratives but to offer space for reflection, connection, and dignity.

Through her practice, she explores themes of collective memory, the meaning of home and land, and the intimate objects that tether us to our histories, identities, and sense of belonging.

Maleah holds a master’s degree in Documentary Film from the University of California, Santa Cruz, where she completed the MFA in Social Documentation.