IROKO - Key Persons
Alejandro ALONSO ESTRELLA (1987, Cuba) Graduated in Documentary Filmmaking at the International School of Cinema and TV in San Antonio de los Baños, Cuba. His short film The Farewell (2014) had its world premiere at IDFA. Duel (2016) was premiered at Cinema du Réel; it won best short film in Mar del Plata Film Festival and Festival of Poppoli. His first feature The Project (2017) premiered at Visions du Réel and was awarded the FIPRESCI Prize at DOK Leipzig. His medium-length film Terranova (2020) co-directed with Alejandro Pérez, won the Ammodo Tiger Short Award at the Rotterdam Film Festival. Abyssal (2021), had its premiere at Visions du Réel, won the Golden Dove Dok Leipzig and received the JHF Humanities Institute Award in Full Frame. In 2021 he was selected as a Resident of the Spanish Film Academy to work on the writing of The Star.
Born in Havana in 1984, Alejandro Rodríguez Fornés "Alucho," is a prolific graphic designer and an important figure in the use of emerging technologies and digital art in Cuban graphic design. He graduated from Havana's Instituto Superior de Diseño in 2008. He has worked as a designer for the magazines Literatura y Arte Unión and La Jiribilla, the publishers Gente Nueva and Abril, and the International School of Film and Television in San Antonio de los Baños, as well as the Cuban Institute of Art and Cinematography. His work has been featured in international festivals in Mexico, Bolivia, Ecuador, Turkey, Spain, and Russia among others, and he has participated in exhibitions in Cuba and abroad. In 2014, he won the Bronze Medal at the 13th biennial International Poster Festival in Mexico. He is a member of the National Union of Writers and Authors of Cuba (UNEAC) and currently works in the office of Images and Communication at the Casa de las Américas.
Job Titles:
- Director
- Graphic Designer
- Dir.
Born 1979 in Gibara. He first graduated from Cuba's National School of Visual Arts. He later graduated in directing at Instituto Superior de ARTE (ISA) and as documentary Film director at EICTV, San Antonio de los Baños. His works have been selected to participate in important festivals. Has been awarded for his Films in Films Festivals. "La Marea" was selected for the critics as on of the best Cuban Films in 2009. Armando was invited by the MOMA (2013 MoMA's International Festival of Nonfiction Film and Media) and the Wintherthur Film Festival to do a retrospective on his previous works.
Aurora D'Errico (Barcelona) is an audiovisual artist. Graduated from Pompeu Fabra University in Audiovisual Communication and from The International Film and Television School of Cuba as a Documentary Filmmaker. Her work focuses mostly on womanhood, exploring themes like the relationship with our bodies, trauma and female friendship. She uses film photography and moving image as a medium, working with fiction, documentary and more hybrid formats.
She has directed the short films "The new normal" (documentary, 2021) and Teteo (fiction, 2023) and is now working on her first feature film.
Graduated in Audiovisual Communication. He has made several works as director, producer and photographer highlighting, "Tundra" (2021, short fiction film, selected in SUNDANCE, Curta Cinema, Locarno, Best Short Film Award at New York City Independent Film Festival 2022, Best Photography Award at International Film Festival of Merida and Yucatan), "La sed humana" ( 2017, short fiction film, 17th edition of the Muestra Joven ICAIC: Audience Award, best cinematography, best art direction and mention for best short fiction film. Best Fiction and Best Cinematography at Almacén de la Imagen 2018. Selected in 40th edition of Havana International Film Festival, World Cinema Amsterdam , Latino & Iberian Film Festival at Yale University), "Autómatas" (2016, short fiction film, Best Short Film at United Latino Film Festival in Cleveland, Honorable Mention at NAU Festival de Cinema e Artes de Expressao Ibérica de Portugal,Official Selection at Américas Film Festival in New York, Hendaia Film Festival in France, 12 Months Films Festival Los Angeles), "El Condor" (2016, Official Selection Los Angeles Cinefest, 16th edition of Muestra Joven ICAIC). He currently completed his short film "El espacio roto" and is part of the creative group Estudio ST.
Master's degree in Documentary Film (Paris Diderot University, Paris, 2013) and Bachelor's Degree in Audiovisual Media Direction ( Higher Institut of Arts, Havana, 2011). Her documentaries have been selected by several international festivals. El Último País, her first feature documentary had its premiere at the Malaga International Film Festival, and was selected in competition at the Rio de Janeiro International Film Festival, 2018. She has collaborated as editor and director for four years ( 2014-2018 ) with the audiovisual production company Geração 80 Produções, in Luanda, Angola, and has produced audiovisual materials for Mosaiko, a civil organization for human rights in Angola. Her latest documentary "Lava Roads", about racism un Cuba, is in its distribution phase and has been supported by the Go Cuba fund of the World Cinema Amsterdam Festival and by the Hanna Arendt Institute of Activism fund.
Ivette is an independent filmmaker and has received various national prizes in her native country Cuba, the most recent is her award for best animation in the XII Muestra Joven ICAIC (Young Directors Film Festival) (2013) and various international awards in Peru, Argentina, Canada and Turkey. She worked for 6 years in the children's programming studios, Animación de la División de Programas Infantiles de la Televisión (Division of Animation of Children's Television Programs) . She has carried out different roles like screenplay writer, designer, props coordinator, entertainer and director. She has ample experience in audiovisual workshops for children, carrying them out in various provinces and during 2012 she worked in the animation studios of the Cuban Institute of Cinematographic Art and Industries teaching workshops to children. She has participated three consecutive years in the international workshops of Universo Audiovisual de la Niñez Latinoamericana y Caribeña (Audiovisual Universe of Latinamerican and Caribbean Children). She is founder and organizer of the children's film festival, Festival Infantil del audiovisual LA ESPIRAL
Job Titles:
- Director
- Dir.
- Film Director
JAVIER LABRADOR DEULOFEU is a film director and cinematographer from Havana, Cuba. He is a graduate of Cuba's top film school, the International Film School of San Antonio de los Baños, where he became part of an active creative community of filmmakers in Havana and Latino America. Labrador's work has been screened at many of the world's top film festivals including Toronto, Berlin, Rotterdam, Camerimage Festival in Poland and the MoMA Documentary Fortnight. Labrador is a Talent Campus alumni for both the Guadalajara and Berlin Film Festivals, where he participated in several masterclasses and film workshops.
A selection of Labrador's notable credits includes the feature films "Santa & Andrés", "The Extraordinary Journey of Celeste Garcia", "Agosto", "Hotel Nueva Isla" and "Los Últimos Frikis", all of which have been premiered at Miami Film Festival. In 2019, he relocated to Miami, where he is developing his next projects.
Jorge Molina Enríquez (born 1966 in Palma Soriano in the province of Santiago) is a Cuban actor and film director. After studying cinema in the USSR, he graduated from the Escuela Internacional de Cine y Television (International Film and TV School of San Antonio de los Baños, Cuba), known as EICTV.
José Luis Aparicio Ferrera (Cuba, 1994), independent filmmaker, critic and curator. He has directed short fiction and documentary films such as Tundra (2021), Sueños al pairo (2020) and El Secadero (2019). His films have screened at festivals such as Sundance, Locarno, Miami, BAFICI, Guanajuato, Curta Cinema and Raindance. He has received awards at Fantaspoa, Pendance, New Jersey, New York City Independent, Seattle Latino, etc. As a critic and curator he created the Cine Cubano en Cuarentena (CCC) initiative, a collaborative effort aimed at the preservation, research and exhibition of the Cuban film legacy. For the Hannah Arendt Institute for Artivism (INSTAR) he curated the exhibition Land without images, the largest retrospective of alternative Cuban cinema to date, as part of the documenta fifteen in Kassel. He was invited to the Locarno Film Festival's Open Doors program and was awarded one of the 2022 Prince Claus Seed Awards. He is currently working as director of the INSTAR Film Festival and is developing his first feature film, El mar, in an artistic residency granted by the Spanish Film Academy.
Graduated in 2011 from the Professional Academy of Visual Arts "Leopoldo Romañach" of Santa Clara in the specialty of painting. Graduated in Audiovisual Communication at the University of Arts (ISA) in Havana, Cuba. He has ventured over the years in animation, experimental cinema (documentary or fiction), always maintaining a preference for free creation and a handmade approach to filmmaking, making use of limited resources and doing more with less.
Katherine Bisquet (Ciudad Nuclear, Cuba, 1992). Writer, documentary filmmaker and activist. B.A. in Spanish from the University of Havana. She has published the poetry books "Algo aquí se descompone" (Colección Sur Editores, Havana, 2014) and "Uranio empobrecido!" (Rialta Ediciones, Querétaro, Mexico, 2021). She has also directed the film "En San Isidro" (Inside San Isidro, short documentary, CCC Collective, 2023). Co-creator of Rialta Magazine's column Cuban Cinema in Quarantine (CCC, 2020-2022), an initiative aimed at the research, preservation, and promotion of Cuban cinema. She was a resident at Künstlerhaus Bethanien, 2021/2022, Berlin, DE. Winner of the 2022 Ciudad de Alcalá Poetry Prize, Spain, with the poetry book "Esquizopatria". Selected for one of the scholarships of the Florida International University program for threatened Cuban scholars in the humanities to carry out the literary project "La blanca memoria". She currently resides in Madrid after being exiled from her country by the Cuban State Security.
Job Titles:
- Director
- Dir.
- Teacher and Consultant at the EICTV
Graduated with a Gold Diploma in the Instituto Superior de Arte (University of the Arts, ISA, La Habana) in 2008, completing his studies at the Escuela Internacional de Cine y Televisión (EICTV), San Antonio de los Baños, Cuba, in 2011. In 2012 he received a scholarship through the ELAP program of the University of Concordia in Montreal. He is a member of the Union of Writers and Artists of Cuba's Film Association.
Along these years, Marcel has been awarded on several occasions the Best Director award at the Muestra Joven ICAIC (Youth Film Festival) which is held every year showcasing new narratives in the Cuban cinema.
His short doc "Cisne cuello negro, cuello blanco" participated in the 2013 Documentary Fortnight Showing at the MoMA Museum in New York.
Marcel Beltrán is teacher and Consultant at the EICTV and at the Cinema Department of the School of Design Altos de Chavón in the Dominican Republic. He has been a member of the jury on several laboratories such as "Nuevas Miradas LAB" (Cuba), FDC (Colombia) and BrLab (Brasil).
Marta María Borrás is born in Havana in 1984. She is an teatrologist, audiovisual director, cultural mediator, professor, and writer, her work is situated between research and creation. She worked for five years in the Theater Department of the Casa de las Américas, where she edited the Conjunto Magazine and organized three editions of the Mayo Teatral Latin American Theater Festival. As an Assistant Professor, she taught ten years in the Faculty of Theater of the Higher Institute of Art (ISA). She has won several prizes and her films have been in the official selection at national and international festivals Currently she coordinates the Scenic Laboratory of Social Experimentation (LEES).
Cuban filmmaker, graduated in Audiovisual Communication from the University of Arts, ISA. He studied the special program Documentary Video Production in Havana, organized by New York University - TISCH School of the Arts. He has worked in different areas of the film industry, with emphasis on directing, scriptwriting and editing of fiction and documentary projects. His work has been selected for festivals such as Guadalajara FICG, Moscow MIFF, Melbourne MIFF, DOC NYC, Trinidad and Tobago TTFF, among others. He is currently studying Fiction Directing at the International Film and Television School of San Antonio de los Baños (EICTV).
Bachelor in Spanish Studies at the Havana University in 1999 and film writing at the International School of Cinema and TV in San Antonio de los Baños, Cuba (EICTV) in 2001. Has been teacher of scriptwriting workshop in Argentina, Brazil, Cuba, Costa Rica and Venezuela. In 2009 directed the documentary "Ampárame" from the TVE Serie "History of Cuban Music" and two short fiction film, "The Courtyard of my Home", best short film in Cuba in 2007 and "Nana" in 2004.
Graduated as a director for radio, cinema and television from the University of Arts (ISA). Previously she had studied drama at the Vicentina de la Torre Arts High School. She has written several plays and scripts and directed for theatre. In 2013 she premiered her play Culpa, winning a grant by the Cuban Association for Young Artists. The project La Costurera has been granted the Norwegian fund for the development of Cuban cinema; Go Cuba, World Cinema Amsterdam in its first year; and the Almacen de la Imagen Festival in Camagüey, Cuba.
SEBASTIÁN MILO (CUBA, 11/10/1979) Graduate Institute of Art in Havana (ISA). He works as a director for the Institute for Film and Television in Cuba. His works include the documentary and fiction, always approximations to the Cuban reality.