ATOM EGOYAN

Egypt-born of Armenian descent, Atom Egoyan grew up in a family of painters in Canada. He began shooting short films at the University of Toronto and became known with Next of Kin (1984). Atom Egoyan’s international breakthrough came in the 1987 Berlinale’s Forum where he presented his feature film Family Viewing. Following Exotica (1994), Prix Fipresci, his work was consecrated at the Festival de Cannes when he won the Grand Prix for The Sweet Hereafter (1997). Other of his international successes include Calendar and Ararat. His work has also earned him two Academy Award® nominations and eight Canadian prizes. Moreover, Atom Egoyan has created art installations that have been presented at the Venice Biennale or Artangel in London. His interest in music has also seen him staging opera: his Walkyrie by Wagner, for the Canadian Opera Company, won a prize in 2006. For theatre too, his Eh Joe by Beckett, which was presented in Dublin and then in London’s West End, won an Award for Best Direction.

TODD SOLONDZ

Todd Solondz (1959, USA) grew up in what he calls the very banal and aesthetic vacuum of the New Jersey suburbs ('but even a sludge farm can have its charms'). He studied Film at the University of New York. His second feature Welcome to the Doll House won the Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival, and his next film Happiness received many awards including the price from the international film critics in Cannes. Since then, he made more five features, including Storytelling (2001), Palindromes (2004), or Wiener-Dog (2016), his latest work. Solondz is, among other filmmakers such as Kelly Reichard, Gus Van Sant or Todd Haynes, an author of the emergent independent American cinema of the 90s.

ANA VAZ

Ana Vaz is an artist and filmmaker whose films, installations and performances speculate upon the relationships between myth and history, self and other through a cosmology of references and perspectives. Assemblages of found and shot materials, her films combine ethnography and speculation in exploring the f(r)ictions imprinted upon cultivated and savage environments. A graduate from the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology & Le Fresnoy, Ana was also a member of the SPEAP (School of Political Arts), a project directed by Bruno Latour. Recent screenings of her work include the NYFF, TIFF, Courtisane, Cinéma du Réel (Grand Prix), BFI Film Festival, CPH:DOX and specific focuses dedicated to her work at the Flaherty Seminar (USA) and Doc's Kingdom (Portugal). Her work has featured in major group shows such as the Moscow Biennial of Young Art, Khiasma (France), Rosa Brux (Belgium) and the Dhaka Art Summit. In 2015, she received the Kazuko Trust Award presented by the Film Society of Lincoln Center in recognition of artistic excellence and innovation in her moving-image work.

JULIÃO SARMENTO

Julião Sarmento was born in 1948 in Lisbon, Portugal, and lives and works in Estoril, Portugal. He studied painting and architecture at the Lisbon School of Fine Arts. Throughout his career, Sarmento has worked in a wide range of media: painting, drawing, sculpture, photography, film, video, performance, sound and installation. He also developed several significant site-specific projects. He has had numerous solo and group exhibitions throughout the world over the past five decades. Julião Sarmento represented Portugal at the 46th Venice Biennale (1997). He was included in Documenta 7 (1982) and Documenta 8 (1987), the Venice Biennale (1980 and 2001), and the São Paulo Biennale in 2002. His work is represented in many public and private collections in North and South America, Europe and Japan.

JOÃO MARIA GUSMÃO / PEDRO PAIVA

João Maria Gusmão (1979, Lisbon) and Pedro Paiva (1977, Lisbon). They studied painting in the Faculty of Fine Arts of Lisbon and work as a duo since March 2001. They were awarded the EDP Novos Artistas Award in 2004 and represented Portugal at the 2009 Venice Biennale. They held individual exhibitions at the Ikon Gallery in Birmingham; at the Mercer Union Center for Contemporary Visual Art in Toronto; at the Kunstverein Hannover; at the CCA Wattis Institute for Contemporary Arts in San Francisco; in the Museum of Contemporary Art of Castile and Leon in Léon; at the Chiado Museum in Lisbon; at the Graça Brandão Gallery in Lisbon; KW Institute in Berlin; Hangar Bicocca in Milan; among other venues. Their works are also featured in several collections, in Portugal and were presented abroad, the 8th Gwangju Biennial in South Korea standing out; as well as the XXVII Biennial of São Paulo. His works are represented in the collections of Tate Modern, MUDAM (Luxembourg), MUSAC, GAM (Bergamo), Serralves Foundation, Chiado Museum, among others.

CARLES GUERRA

Carles Guerra (Amposta, 1965) is the director of Fundació Antoni Tàpies. From 2009 to 2011, he was Director of La Virreina Centre de la Imatge, Barcelona, and Chief Curator at the Museu d’Art Contemporani de Barcelona (MACBA) from 2011 to 2013. He has a PhD in Fine Arts from the University of Barcelona and he is a professor of Social Structures and Cultural Trends at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra. His work and research investigate the dialogical aspects of artistic practice and the cultural policies of Post-Fordism. Among the exhibitions he has curated, are Antiphotojournalism (2010), 1979. A Monument to Radical Instants (2011), Phantom Home. Ahlam Shibli (2013), Nitrate. Xavier Ribas (2014) and Art & Language Uncompleted.The Philippe Méaille Collection (2014). His most recent exhibitions include a survey of Harun Farocki’s work at the IVAM and the Fundació Antoni Tàpies, both co-curated with Antje Ehmann.

NUNO CRESPO

Nuno Crespo has a PhD in Philosophy, a postgraduate degree in Aesthetics and a degree in Philosophy, always at the Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Portugal. He was an Assistant Researcher at the New University of Lisbon. His work is dedicated to the interdisciplinarity between art, architecture, criticism and history of art and philosophy. He has published in scientific journals, but also as an art critic. He coordinated the research project Art. Criticism. Politics at the Institute of Art History. He is currently Dean of the School of Arts of Universidade Católica Portuguesa.

DANIEL RIBAS

Born and lives in Porto. Assistant Professor of film studies at the School of Arts of the Portuguese Catholic University and deputy director of CITAR – Research Center in Science and Technology of the Arts. He is also programmer of Porto/Post/Doc: Film & Media Festival and Curtas Vila do Conde. PhD in Cultural Studies from the Universities of Aveiro and Minho, he wrote several articles and book chapters on Portuguese cinema, contemporary cinema and documentary. Founding and former President of AIM – Portuguese Association of Moving Image Researchers.

GUILHERME BLANC

Guilherme Blanc holds a degree in Law from the University of Porto and an MA degree in Cultural Policy and Management from City University London. Between 2010 and 2014, he taught in different undergraduate and postgraduate courses in the field of Cultural Policy and Management and worked as independent curator in numerous projects, collaborating with institutions such as the Institute for Contemporary Arts (ICA), the Institut Français, the Whitechapel Gallery and the Barbican Center with film screenings of Portuguese artists. In 2012 he joined the fundraising team at the Barbican Center and the following year he was invited to the position of Cultural Assistant of Paulo Cunha e Silva at the Porto City Council. He is currently Deputy of the Mayor of Porto for the Culture area.

SABETH BUCHMANN

Sabeth Buchmann is an art historian and art critic. She is currently Professor of Modern and Postmodern Art and the Head of the Institute for Art Theory and Cultural Studies at the Academy of Fine Arts, Vienna. She regularly contributes to books, magazines and catalogues. Her publications include Film, Avantgarde und Biopolitik (Academy of Fine Arts, Vienna, 2009) and Art After Conceptual Art(The MIT Press, 2006).