Jose Luís Guerín
Jose Luís Guerín
Directing in the Field
Visiting Lecturer (2018)
José Luis Guerín is a filmmaker who also has been lecturing extensively at conferences, film festivals, and universities such as Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona and EICTV in Cuba.
Born in Barcelona (1960) he started his career directing experimental short films from 1975 to 1983. Guerín made his feature-film debut with BERTA'S MOTIVES (1985), which won a number of awards, including a special prize at the Berlinale Forum. In 1988, he directed the Spanish episode of CITY LIFE which was awarded in Berlin, Rotterdam and Montreal Film Festivals.
In 1990, José directed INNISFREE, presented in competition at Cannes International Film Festival, which looks at the traces that the filming of John Ford’s movie The Quiet Man (1952) had left behind in the Irish town where it was shot. In 1997, he directed TREN DE SOMBRAS – a meditation on filming from its very origins, as a living memory or a recreation of fictions – which was presented during the Directors’ Fortnight in Cannes and obtained the Golden and Silver Melies awarded by the European Federation of Fantasy Film Festivals.
In 2001, José Luis Guerin directed EN CONSTRUCCION, awarded in San Sebastian Festival and with which he won the Goya award for Best Documentary Feature, the Special Jury Prize and the FIPRESCI International Critics’ Prize at the San Sebastián Festival and the 2001 Spanish National Cinematography Prize.
In 2007 Guerin made Unas fotos en la ciudad de Sylvia (Photos in the City of Sylvia) as well as the feature drama EN LA CIUDAD DE SYLVIA which was screened at the Venice Film Festival and at the Toronto Film Festival. In 2007 he also created the photo-installation Las mujeres que no conocemos (Women We Don’t Know) for the Spanish Pavilion at the 52nd Venice Biennale. His following works were GUEST (2010), which was filmed on locations around the world over a one-year period and was screened at the Venice Festival, and the exhibition installation La dama de Corinto (The Lady from Corinth).
He also co-directed CORRESPONDENCE with Jonas Mekas in 2011 and in the same year made MEMORIES OF A MORNING. His 2015 drama THE ACADEMY OF MUSES was awarded the Gold Giraldillo at Seville EFF and selected at IFF Rotterdam, Locarno FF and CPH:DOX film festivals amongst others. It won the Best Director award in the Official Competition at FICCI in 2016.
