Profiles: Santiago Lozano | Proimágenes Colombia

Santiago Lozano Álvarez is a communication professional from the Universidad del Valle. In 2007, he received a scholarship from the Carolina Foundation to study for a Master's Degree in Film and Television Screenwriting at the Carlos III University in Madrid, Spain. He currently teaches in the Film and Digital Communication program at the Universidad Autónoma de Occidente.

He has worked as a researcher and director for various cultural programs at Señal Colombia. He also worked as a still photographer on the feature films El vuelco del cangrejo (Crab Trap) by Oscar Ruiz Navia  (Fispreci Award, Berlin 2010) and Sal (Salt) by William Vega. As assistant director, he worked on Garras de oro: mudo testigo de una injusticia (Golden Claws: Mute Witness of an Injustice, 2014) by Oscar Campo and La sirga (The Towrope) by William Vega (Directors' Fortnight, Cannes 2012). He co-directed the documentary Retrato de un tiempo de hongos (Portrait of a Time of Mushrooms) about the film Los hongos (The Mushrooms) by Oscar Ruiz Navia (Jury Prize, Locarno 2014).
 
His debut feature film, Siembra (Seedtime), was co-written and co-directed with Ángela Osorio. This film premiered at the 2015 Locarno Festival (Filmmakers of the Present), where it won the Boccalino Independent Critics' Prize. It also received the Best Film Award at the CineLatino Toulouse Festival, France, in 2016, the Special Jury Prize at the Cartagena de Indias International Film Festival (FICCI) 2016, the Best Film Award at the Rec Tarragona Festival, Spain, 2015, and the Audience Award at the Novos Cinemas Galicia 2016 Festival, among others. Siembra was released in commercial cinemas in Colombia in 2016.

His second feature film, Yo vi tres luces negras (I Saw Three Black Lights), was part of the Cinefondation Residency at the 2018 Cannes Film Festival and received the CNC Development Award for the best project of the residency. The film had its world premiere in the Panorama section at the 74th Berlin Film Festival and was awarded the Grand Prix Coup De Coeur at the 36th edition of the Toulouse Film Festival. It has won several national and international awards, including the Film Development Fund - FDC and the Regional Fund Nouvelle Aquitaine de Bordeaux - F.I.LM. France, co-production support from Ibermedia, Eficine Mexico, and the World Cinema Fund of the Berlin Film Festival. It also won the Fox-Telecolombia Award for Best Project at the Bogotá Audiovisual Market BAM 2021. It was commercially released in Colombia on May 9, 2024.
 
His previous works include the short documentaries Calígula (2003), Un nombre para desplazado (A Name for Displaced, 2003), Viaje de tambores (Drum Journey, 2005), Las regias (The regal ones, 2009), Detrás del cangrejo (Behind the crab, 2010) and El alma cuando sale (The soul when it comes out, 2021), the latter co-directed with Mauricio Prieto. He also directed the fiction short Cruza (Crossing) with Ángela Osorio, presented at the 2018 Locarno Film Festival as part of the Filmmakers Academy.

In 2005, he directed, wrote, and edited the documentary Silo-ve, un niño (Silo-ve, a Child, 2005) for the ATEI channel in Spain. This documentary won the Ojos Nuevos competition at the Muestra Documental Pedazos de Nuestra Realidad, organized by the Andean Parliament. This award allowed him to participate in Doc Buenos Aires 2006. The documentary also received an honorable mention at the Festival Contra el Silencio Todas las Voces (Mexico, 2006) and was selected by the Ministry of Culture to participate in the Festival of the Imaginary in Paris in 2008.
 
He is one of the six directors of the original series Turbia (Muddy), produced by Contravía Films, Inercia Películas, and Telepacífico and acquired by Vix+. The series premiered in the International Panorama Competition at the Series Mania Festival in France and won the Best Latin American Fiction Series and the Grand Prize for Designing the Future at the TAL 2021 Awards (Latin American Public Television Awards).
 
He is currently directing, together with Ángela Osorio, the documentary Oro Pacífico (Pacific Gold), which is in post-production. In this film, he also took part in the research and direction of the photography.