Pilar Monsell

Spain

Córdoba, 1979.

Filmmaker, artist and researcher. After she studied Artistic Photography (San Telmo Málaga 2001) and Audiovisual Communication (UMA, 2005) in Andalucia, Monsell moved to Barcelona to follow the Master in Creative Documentary (2007) and she started making films. She has recently finished the Master in Contemporary Cinema & Audiovisual Studies (2021) at the Pompeu Fabra University. She is currently based in Madrid, where she carries out artistic audiovisual projects from film-essay to documentary through experimental cinema, film-performance or memory and archive film. 

Pilar Monsell’s first film “Distancias” (28 min) was premiered in 2008 at the 49th Festival dei Popoli in Florence, where it won the Audience Award. It then toured to numerous international festivals, such as MedFilm Festival in Rome, Festival de Cine Migrante in Buenos Aires, Muestra de Cine Experimental in Maldonado (Uruguay), Ourense Film Festival, African Film Festival in Tarifa, Documenta Madrid and more others.

In 2012, she completed the short film “Pan, Trabajo y Libertad” (26 min) premiered at Doc Lisboa 2012 International Film Festival and she participates also in the french collective cinema project 100jours, directing the short film “+46” (6 min). In 2013, she got Manuel Cintra Ferreira Fellow from the Doc’s Kingdom International Documentary Cinema Seminar, directing the short film “Vulcão” (11 min).

In 2014, her first feature film “África 815” (66 min) premiered at Doc Lisboa with which she toured then to others festivals where she won: Distribution Award Festival Márgenes 2014, Best Feature Documentary Zinegoak 2014, Nomination to ASECAN 2014 as First Film and Best Documentary Film, Panorama Award at L’Alternativa Festival de Cine Independiente de Barcelona 2015, Special Jury Mention at CEMEDOC Mexico 2015. It was also selected at IBAFF Murcia 2015, Cinema du Reel París 2015, États Généraux du film documentaire 2015, The Limit of our Gaze/New York University 2015 or Cinespaña Toulouse 2015 and more others.

In 2017, her short film “Two dreams later” (18 min) was premiered at the Málaga Film Festival where she won the Special Jury Award,  then she won the Honored Mention of the Section Fronteras Destruidas at the Lima Independent International Film Festival 2018 (Perú) and the Nomination to Best Short Documentary Film in the ASECAN Awards of Andalusian Cinema 2018. The film then toured to others festivals as Fronteira Experimental Film Festival (Brasil), L’Alternativa Festival de Cine Independiente, Festival Mondiale de Cinemas Sauvages de Bruselas o Back to the future Festival in Rotterdam, Filmadrid 2018 o Zinebi 2018.

In 2018-2019, Monsell  works as a filmmaker for the spanish documentary TV Program “Salvados” at La Sexta TV, directed and produced by Jordi Évole and Ramón Lara (Barcelona), producing the chapters “Sexo: La Mala educación”, “Temporeras” or “Banca Navidad” between so others. 

In 2020, she finished “Una revuelta sin imágenes” (14 min) which was Nominated to Best Short Documentary Film in the ASECAN Awards of Andalusian Cinema 2020. It’s touring until now and it has been shown at the New York Film Festival, Festival de Cine de Gijón, Festival De Málaga, Arica Doc (Chile), Festival de Cine Europeo de Sevilla, La inesperada Barcelona, Festival dei Popoli (Firenze, Italy), Documenta Madrid o Doc Lisboa. In the same year, Monsell directed the tv documentary “ELLAS” (57 min) produced by Atresmedia & Buendia Studios with which she won “Premio Triángulo Cultura de COGAM”. In December 2020, Monsell premiered her short films series “8S8” produced by Filmoteca de Andalucía and “Proyecto Mi Vida” which artistic installation is currently touring Andalucía.