Ian Darling is an award winning documentary film director and producer based in Sydney, Australia.

He is Executive Director of Shark Island Productions a documentary production company with extensive outreach and education programs. His credits as a Producer and Director include Paul Kelly - Stories of Me, The Oasis, Polly and Me, The Soldier, In The Company of Actors, Alone Across Australia and Woodstock for Capitalists.

Biographie

Darling’s first documentary in 2001 Woodstock for Capitalists was a film featuring investors and philanthropists Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger and won the CINE Golden Eagle Award. His next film in 2004 Alone Across Australia about extreme adventurer Jon Muir was voted one of the 20 best adventure films of all time by Men’s Journal Magazine and won over 32 international awards.
In The Company of Actors was a 2007 film that followed the Journey of the Sydney Theatre Company cast of Hedda Gabler from rehearsal room in Sydney through to opening night in New York. The cast featured Cate Blanchett, Hugo Weaving and Robyn Nevin. The Oasis was a multi-award winning documentary that was filmed over 2 years about Australia’s homeless youth. The film had a strong social and education outreach campaign which led to the most significant national inquiry into youth homelessness in 20 years. The Oasis became the inspiration to Darling filming two docu-dramas Polly and Me (a harrowing tale of child abuse and neglect, seen through the eyes of an 8 year old girl), and Wall Boy (a runaway forced into teenage prostitution and the courageous outreach worker who attempts to rescue him). The Soldier was a documentary on Ken Depena, a devotee of the Salvation Army since 1949 who featured in The Oasis, the film garnered a 'Special Mention' at the Antenna Documentary Film Festival. Paul Kelly - Stories of Me based on prominent Australian singer songwriter Paul Kelly opened at the Melbourne International Film Festival in 2012 and won the Film Critics Circle of Australia Best Documentary Award.
Currently in production is Stories From the Inside about a group of young first time offenders in a Maximum Security Prison and Our Little Garden a film about environmental sustainability and survival in a remote country community.

Darling is the founder and patron of the Documentary Australia Foundation (DAF), a not for profit organisation which encourages collaboration between philanthropic grant makers, charities and documentary filmmakers and winner of the Stanley Hawes Award in 2013. He was Chair of the Documentary Australia Foundation from 2006 to 2011.
Ian Darling is Chair of The Caledonia Foundation (since 2001), a private foundation focusing on the education, training and welfare of disadvantaged young Australians. He was the founder and Managing Director of the Caledonia Investments group from 1992 to 2003.
He is Patron of the Kangaroo Valley Upper River Hall Arts Festival, and a member of the Advisory Board of the Centre for Social Impact.
Ian Darling was Chair of the Sydney Theatre Company (STC) and STC Foundation from 2006-2010. He appointed Cate Blanchett and Andrew Upton as Co-Artistic Directors in 2008 and after leaving STC as Chairman, his position was replaced by David Gonski. He has been a member of the Advisory Board of The Salvation Army and Chair of The Oasis Youth Support Network, and a Director of the National Institute of Dramatic Art (NIDA).

Ian Darling holds an MBA from the International Institute for Management Development (IMD) in Switzerland, a BA from the Australian National University and has studied at the New York Film Academy.