Mercedes Álvarez (Aldealseñor, 1966)

Mercedes Álvarez was born in 1966 in Aldealseñor in the province of Castile and León. In 1997 she directed a short film, El viento africano. She has been focused on documentary since 1998, and she completed a Master of Creative Documentary at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra of Barcelona. She worked as an editor on José Luís Guerín’s film En construcción. In 2004 she directed her first film, the full-length documentary El cielo gira, which could be seen in many cinemas across the world and was a winner at numerous festivals of renown: of note are the Tiger Award (Rotterdam Film Festival 2004), the Grand Prix du Cinéma du Réel, Paris 2005, the Premio Unosguardo for Best Film, Infinity Festival, Best Film at the Buenos Aires Festival Internacional de Cine Independiente (BAFICI), the Premio del Círculo de Escritores Cinematográficos for best editing and best new director, the Audience Award at the Paris Film Festival (July 2005) and the Premio Sigmis for Best Film (Asociación Católica).

She settled in Catalonia and in 2007 began work on the feature film Mercado de futuros, co-produced by TV3 (Televisió de Catalunya) and TVE (Televisió Espanyola), which premiered in 2011 and was selected by the world’s most important film festivals: the Prix Regard Neuf de l’Etat de Vaud at Visions du Réel, Nyon (Switzerland), Special Mention at the Buenos Aires Festival Internacional de Cinema Independiente (BAFICI) and the Premio Navaja de Buñuel of RTVE’s Versión Española.

In 2012 she was working on a new production: Cinco elementos para cualquier universo.