Isabelle Riva was born in 1974 and grew up in small northern Ontario communities like Longlac, Nakina and Thunder Bay. She demonstrated a passion for the audio-visual soon after her father illegally hooked up the movie channel with his garbage dump antenna in 1982. She discovered that people made a living at making movies and has since worked towards independently producing video and super 8 films. Somehow having inherited a knack for making do with low-tech means, she has managed to produce seven works during her studies at McGill University. Isabelle holds a B.A. Honours in Cultural Studies and plans to continue her guerrilla video-making with any camera she can scavenge.