Andrés Arizmendy Benavides is a film and television filmmaker from the National University of Colombia, currently working as Audiovisual Production Manager at the Platzi's Production team. Recently, he was selected among thousands of filmmakers from around the world to be part of the Berlin Talents 2021 of the prestigious Berlin Film Festival (Berlinale). He has been a videographer, photographer, teacher, director of photography, and visual artist for transdisciplinary dance, multimedia, short film, feature film, documentary, video clip, and advertising projects. He worked for RTVC, the Bogotá Secretary of Education, the National Agency for Overcoming Extreme Poverty, and Unimedios. He was the winner of the Fund for Cinematographic Development in its modality of writing for a feature film in 2013 and was part of the Talent Campus Buenos Aires 2013. The Bogotá District Cinematheque also invited him to be part of the Cinemateca Rodante strategy as a workshop leader for the areas of production and direction of photography for 5 consecutive years when he wrote a chapter on photography in the publication "Routes for the creation, circulation, and preservation of audiovisual works", he was also a teacher at the Black Maria Film School in staging. Recently, he was part of the team invited to the Cross-Cultural Art Labin Juist, Germany, where he gave a workshop on video art to students from Georgia, Azerbaijan, and Armenia.
As a visual artist, his video art piece "Palacio de Justicia en llamas" (2012) stands out for the exhibition "lose human form A seismic image of the eighties in Latin America" at the Reina Sofía Museum in Spain. He participated as an assistant director, lighting designer, and live video in “Crack me, DivideX2, Take your share and run” by Juana del Mar Jiménez, winner of the 2019 Colombian Ministry of Culture Grant, as well as the piece “ÑAMIAJAPÚ DAJÃRÃSA/ Mañana Volvemos” by Juan Camilo Herrera, also the winner of this grant, where he was in charge of the video mapping and live video. In "Beehive”, a piece directed by Edna Orozco and winner of the 2018 Ministry of Culture scholarship for interdisciplinary medium format creation, was part of the live video and mapping team.
As a director and producer, he has excelled for short films such as “Fading” which he made with the advice of the Iranian director Abbas Kiarostami; “Time goes by” with which she participated in national and international film festivals, winning the Best Actress award at the 2012 In Vitro Visual Festival, in which she also received 8 nominations, including the best director, and was also selected to be part of the Colombia in Shorts portfolio Promotional DVD of the Colombian short from the Ministry of Culture of Colombia that was part of the Clermont-Ferrand Short Film Market 2013; “Train” video clip that he directed for the Ecuadorian artist Marley Muerto, selected as one of the 15 best Latin American video clips in 2012 according to the North American portal Remezcla; “One art in Colombia” made with archival material from the 90s; “Think/Classify: Luis Ospina Archive” that he directed as part of the project to catalog and recover the personal archive of the Colombian filmmaker Luis Ospina; “Translation as a method and practice for working with inclusive and physically integrated dance” which he made together with the English artist Romany Dear with the support of Creative Scotland; and various advertising pieces for companies such as Plazi, IDARTES, The Red Wagon Band, and Shell do Brazil.
His work as a cinematographer has been highlighted thanks to films like “Aeon Oz” shot in India and Nepal still in post-production; short films how “Oranges” winner of the best short film at the Palm Springs International Film Festival & ShortFest and at the 29th Mar del Plata Film Festival; “Cassavas” official selection of the 20 Brussels Short Film Festival; “Three feet” official selection of the 65 International Short Film Festival of Oberhausen; “The tiple” winner of Best Short Film at the 53rd International Festival of Cartagena de Indias; “Jar” official selection at the Houston Latino Film Festival 2018; “Hundred years older” winner of the best documentary short film at The Colombian International Film Festival New York; “Intuition” winner of the Alternative Fiction Short Film Scholarship; “Her and the implosion” winner of the best photography at the 8th El Espejo International Short Film Festival and official competition at the 27th Mar del Plata Film Festival; video clips for bands like the damn office workers and Melanin and Skinny Flow;as well as advertising pieces for production companies such as Notaries and Diphthong.
He has worked in feature films such as “Morbid cholera”, a Colombian film about to be released, where he served as a gaffer; “Relative” an official selection of the Toronto International Film Festival, where he worked as a Director and Producer of Marketing and Distribution (PMD); Y "Out of the dark" taking charge of the making of.
Their photographic work has been published and disseminated at the national level and he has developed small personal projects with which he has participated in collective exhibitions.
He is currently working on the writing of the short film "Renacuajos" and his film "Días aún más extraños".