Tzang Merwyn Tong is an award-winning Singapore-based screenwriter, educator and filmmaker known for his surreal independent films made under tight constraints. His films have been screened in Rotterdam, Berlin, Montreal, Lund, Hong Kong and Tel Aviv, and has won festival acclaim for their socially relevant themes.

Tzang received an MA in Arts Pedagogy and Practice from LASALLE (2022), awarded by Goldsmiths, University of London with distinction. His MA Thesis about pedagogical approaches to make the practice of filmmaking more in-the-present using Zen Philosophy has been presented at academic conferences in Paris, Glasgow and Tokyo. An alumnus of the Berlinale Talent Campus, Tzang also holds a BA in Mass Communications from Curtin University in Australia.

Tzang is currently a Full Time Lecturer at Republic Polytechnic’s School of Technology for the Arts teaching Visual Storytelling and Film Appreciation. He has previously taught at Nanyang Technological University, Ngee Ann Polytechnic, ITE College, and has guest lectured at Yale-NUS, LASALLE and Rangsit University.

 

Tzang is also the founder and festival director of First Shot(s), a student-run micro film festival that celebrates raw talent and the first works of budding visual storytellers.