Jury and Guests

Jury

Guests

Bruno Huca

Actor, Performer, Singer
Queer Art Competition

Bruno Huca is the actor, performer, movement and voice director, creative artist, and Huca the singer, musician, composer. The ‘two’ are this same black, queer, migrant body, this same restless soul navigating the world between theatre, performing arts, music, and movement in search of questions that help us plant another place. With a degree in Theatre from the Escola Superior de Teatro e Cinema and a professional career spanning more than 21 years and 27 years on stage, the first of which were in his native land: Mozambique.

Catarina Vasconcelos

Filmmaker
Feature Film Competition

Filmmaker, born in Lisbon in 1986. Her debut short film Metaphor or Sadness Inside Out (2014) premiered at Cinema du Réel, where it was distinguished as Best Short Film. Her debut feature The Metamorphosis of Birds (2020) was acclaimed by the press and awarded in the Encounters section of the Berlinale, followed by an extensive international festival run. Recently, she directed Nocturne for a Forest (2023), which premiered at the Locarno Film Festival. She’s a tutor at the Elías Querejeta Zine Eskola in San Sebastian since 2022.

Diego Bragà

Artist
Short Film Competition, "In My Shorts" Competition

Trans travesti artist, born in Belo Horizonte, living in Lisbon. She studied at the London International School of Performing Arts and has a master's degree in Art Theory from FBAUL. Her work combines spirituality, eroticism and queer archaeology. In 2025, she presented Cleópatra & António at C.A.M. In 2020-2021, she was supported by the Sundance Institute. Her short film Think About the Beautiful Future Ahead (2021) can be seen in the New York Times/Op-Docs. She directed the music videos for sex symbol DIDIRELLA. Her films have been screened at Queer Lisboa, Temps d'Images, Fringe! Queer Film & Arts Fest and SFFILM. In 2025, she will premiere the opera A GENTE NA BOATE SOFRE JUNTO.

Photo: João Mendes & João Barriga

Francisca Carneiro Fernandes

Cultural manager
Feature Film Competition

Born in Porto, she holds a degree in Law and Business Management. She was Chair of the Board of Directors of Teatro Nacional São João and General Director of the Culture Department of Ágora – Cultura e Desporto do Porto, which manages the Teatro Municipal do Porto of which she was also Executive Director. Since then, she has taken on the role of Director of New Projects, notably the future Matadouro and CACE Cultural Centres. She was Chair of the Board of Performart – Association for the Performing Arts until 2023 and Chair of the Board of Directors of the Centro Cultural de Belém (2023-2024). She is a member of the Board of Directors of the Union of European Theatres and, since 2025, has been Chair of PEARLE – Live Performance Europe, the European Federation of Live Music and Performance Organisations.

Francisca Manuel

Filmmaker
Short Film Competition, "In My Shorts" Competition

With a postgraduate degree in Multimedia Art, she studied film and architecture in Lisbon. Her work lies at the intersection of moving images, architectural space and the performative gesture. Between film, photography and video installation, the filmmaker builds a visual lexicon that questions memory as living matter, in constant re-inscription. Her works have been presented at international film festivals and are part of art collections, such as the EDP Foundation and the Peter Meeker collection, confirming the relevance of her work at the intersection between film and visual arts.

Photo: Alípio Padilha

Gustavo Scofano

Programmer, Distributor
Feature Film Competition

Born in Rio de Janeiro in 1984, he holds a degree in Social Communication from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro. He has created and directed documentary series for channels such as MTV, VH1, and GNT. He works with film programming for various events and served for many years as Head of Programming for the Festival do Rio, where he participated in the creation of the LGBTQIA+ Felix Award. He has been a member of juries such as the Teddy Award (Berlinale) and the Festival Mix Brasil. Since 2017, has also been working with film distribution in Portugal. Gustavo is currently developing his first feature-length documentary.

Luisa Cunha

Visual artist
Queer Art Competition

Born in Lisbon in 1949, since the 1990s her work has spanned through sound, photography, video, drawing, sculpture, and performance. In 2021, she represented Portugal at the 34th São Paulo Biennial and received the EDP Art Foundation Grand Prize, followed by the anthological exhibition ‘Hello! Are You There?’ dedicated to her at MAAT. He has exhibited individually at the Atelier-Museu Júlio Pomar, Fundação de Serralves, Chiado 8, Miguel Nabinho Gallery, among others. She has shown her work internationally in museums, foundations and biennials. Her work is represented in various institutional collections.

Marta Sousa Ribeiro

Filmmaker, Producer
Documentary Competition

Born in Lisbon in 1992. She studied film, drawing, and painting in Portugal and Denmark. She co-founded the production company VIDEOLOTION and produced the feature film Verão Danado (2017). She directed an episode for the series Subsolo (2018) and co-directed another for the series Crias (2019). Her first feature film, Simon Chama (2020), premiered in San Sebastián and won an award at IndieLisboa. He co-directed the animation As Horas (2022) with Marta Reis Andrade and directed the short film/video installation The Illusion of an Everlasting Kiss (2023). He coordinated the film & TV department at the production company Playground between 2024 and 2025.

ROD

Visual artist, Researcher
Documentary Competition

Brazilian visual artist and researcher based in Lisbon. He holds a PhD in Sociology from ICS-UL and conducted a postdoctoral research at the Centre for Communication and Society Studies at the University of Minho. His artistic practice develops in the field of decolonial criticism and spans painting, sculpture, performance, drawing, digital collage and graphic design. Through his own projects and transdisciplinary collaborations, he has contributed to the debate on the politics of image, dissident bodies and artistic practices committed to social justice. He co-founded the Afrontosas Collective and the União Negra das Artes.

Photo: Raquel Pimentel

Silvia Alves

Journalist
Documentary Competition

Journalist, with a degree in Modern Languages and Literature, a postgraduate degree in Human Ecology and Contemporary Social Issues, and doctoral studies in Communication Sciences. She started out in radio in 1987 with the programme Sete Mares on Antena 1. In 1991, she moved to television as presenter and editor of the programme Caderno Diário on RTP1, and later of the environmental programme Planeta Azul. She has developed several projects and formats in the areas of Environment, Science, Health, Literacy and Citizenship. On Antena 2, she presents the daily programme Há 100 Anos, and on RTP 2 she is the author of programmes, documentaries and reports focusing on gender equality, history and the arts.

Stéphane Gérard

Filmmaker
Queer Art Competition

Filmmaker, born in 1987, living in Paris. His experimental cinema focuses on the history of mobilizations and the representation of politics of gender, sexual orientation, HIV/AIDS and people of African descent: History Doesn’t Have to Repeat Itself (2014), La Machine avalée (2015), Entre garçons (2018), The Realness and the Twist (2024). His collaboration with filmmaker Lionel Soukaz led him to co-direct En corps + (2021) for Mucem, and Artistes en zone troublés (2023) for Palais de Tokyo, which belong to a wider reflection about audiovisual archives preservation. His practice also includes film programming and distribution.

Photo: Quentin Balpe

Tiago Manaia

Cultural journalist, Actor
Short Film Competition, "In My Shorts" Competition

Born in Lisbon, he moved to Paris at the age of 18, where he studied at the Conservatoire National Supérieur d'Art Dramatique. In film, he has worked with Christophe Honoré, Patric Chiha, Maya Da-Rin, and João Canijo, and in theatre with Carlos Avilez, Cyril Teste, and Luís Miguel Cintra. He has collaborated with the newspaper Público and Vogue magazine. For Máxima magazine, he has interviewed personalities from film, literature, and music. For the Lux Frágil nightclub, he edited, alongside Manuel Reis, an immense photographic archive on Lisbon's nightlife. On the Now channel, he presents the weekly programme Dicionário de Estilo, combining fashion and global current affairs.

Alba Cros

Filmmaker
Short Film Competition

Alba Cros is a Catalan filmmaker. She has co-directed films with Nora Haddad, Laia Albert and Laura Rius Aran, worked as director of photography and actress for Zaida Carmona's La Amiga de Mi Amiga, and as assistant director for The Days to Come, by Carlos Marquès-Marcet. Currently, she is working on the short film If I Die Tomorrow (in post-production) and the film Drif (Beats of love) (in development). This year, Alba participates in the Short Film Competition with her film Ferides.

Anaïs Kaboré

Filmmaker
"In My Shorts" Competition

Anaïs Kaboré’s work as a filmmaker often starts from a philosophical framework such as the Anthropocene, phenomenology, post-colonialism, etc, and, from there, she explores how these frameworks influence the content and narrative style of her films. By examining how films are perceived, the way she presents the story becomes an integral part of the narrative. Part of this exploration is working with non-actors and improvisation. This year, she participates in the "In My Shorts" Competition with her film Touch Me with Your Eyes.

André Murraças

Filmmaker
Gender Play

André Murraças (1976) has a degree in Performing Arts from ESTC (Lisbon) and a Master of Arts in Scenography from the Hogeschool voor de Kunsten in Utrecht. He also holds a master's degree in Communication Sciences from the FCSH (Lisbon). In cinema, he has worked as a director, actor and screenwriter; in theatre, he is an award-winning director, playwright, set designer and performer, with shows presented in various theatres across the country. He is the creator of O Museu Fora do Armário, a project for research and visibility of queer artists and works in Portuguese museums, and Queerquivo, a Portuguese LGBTQIA+ archive in digital and book format. His documentary This Woman Is a Man will be screened this year in the Gender Play strand.

Caio Amado Soares

Guest programmer
Queer Focus

Caio Amado Soares is a Portuguese visual artist and filmmaker based in Berlin. He studied Arts and Media at the universities of Lisbon and Berlin. His work imagines queer realities through the creation of a fantastic camp world. In 2019 he created the webseries Club Splendida, shown internationally, like many of his other works and collaborations. This year, he is the guest programmer for the Queer Focus Section, with the programme "Did You Say You Were Trans?".

Deborah Viegas

Editor
"In My Shorts" Competition

Deborah Viegas is the editor of Pedro Gonçalves Ribeiro's film Rezbotanik, which participates in this year's “In My Shorts” Competition.

Elsa Michaud

Filmmaker
"In My Shorts" Competition

Elsa Michaud is a director, composer, choreographer, stunt driver, and actress, graduate from the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris. In her films, performances, and concerts, women drift Mercedes, caress white limousines, sing tire screeches, and transform themselves. The cars become beings in their own right that suffer the end of a suffocating world and have the power to open hidden portals to a strange yet different world. This year, Elsa participates in the "In My Shorts" Competition with her film Metamorphosia.

Fernando Heitor

Actor, Director, Theatre Producer
Gender Play

Fernado Heitor is a Portuguese actor, director, and theatre producer. This year, he will participate in the talk following the screening of the film This Woman Is a Man, by André Murraças and Flávio Gil.

Flávio Gil

Filmmaker
Gender Play

Flávio Gil made his debut as an actor and singer in 2008. Since then, he has taken part in various shows and television programmes and series. In cinema, he has worked with António-Pedro Vasconcelos ("Parque Mayer"), Leandro Ferreira ("Um Jantar Muito Original") and starred in "Editor Contra", by Luís Alvarães. He co-coordinated the documentary "História do Teatro de Revista em Portugal". His documentary This Woman Is a Man will be screened this year in the Gender Play strand.

Giulia Cosentino

Filmmaker
Short Film Competition

Giulia Cosentino is a film director, screenwriter and researcher, born in Catania, Sicily. She graduated in Cinema and Visual Art attending Roma Tre University, Sorbonne Nouvelle in Paris, Nova in Lisbon and Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona. She has collaborated in many movies, among them Martin Eden, by Pietro Marcello, Io capitano, by Matteo Garrone, and Grand Tour, by Miguel Gomes. This year, Giulia participates in the Short Film Competition with her film The First Times.

Guto Parente

Filmmaker
Special Screenings

Guto Parente was born in 1983 in Fortaleza, Brazil. He finished his Film studies in 2008 at Escola do Audiovisual de Fortaleza and from 2008 until 2016 was member of the artists collective Alumbramento, a period where he wrote and directed seven shorts and six feature films, most of them made with small crews, fast shootings and very low budgets. By the end of that period, Guto Parente and Ticiana Augusto Lima, his creative partner and producer since 2011, founded the production company Tardo Films. Guto's works have screened in film festivals such as Locarno, Rotterdam, Viennale, FID Marseille and Bafici, among others. This year, Guto will be presenting his new film Death and Life Madalena at the festival.

Ian Kaler

Queer Focus

Ian Kaler is a filmmaker and performer with a background in Choreography and Contemporary Dance. He has an MA in Film Making – Directing Fiction from Goldsmiths, University of London. Prior he studied Transmedial Art at the University of Applied Arts, Vienna and graduated from the BA Contemporary Dance, Context, Choreography at the University of Arts, Berlin. Some of the core-themes his work addresses center embodiment and coming-of-age through a trans masculine lens, the figurative composition of the still and moving body, the relationship between bodies and the space/s they inhabit, horses and other sentient beings and encounters with them. This year, Ian participates in the Queer Focus with his film The Growing Edge.

Photo: Chris Mann

Igor Mo

Actor
Queer Art Competition

Igor Mo is the protagonist and co-writer of Sergio Silva's film Not even God Is as Fair as Your Jeans, which participates in this year's Queer Art Competition.

Inês Oliveira

Filmmaker
Short Film Competition

Inês Oliveira (1976) lives and works in Lisbon. She studied Sculpture, Jewelry and Drawing at Ar.Co, Cinema at ESTC, and Video Art at Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian. She teaches cinema regularly at ESAD, Ar.Co and ACT. Since 2003, her main activity has been screenwriting and film directing. Her films have been awarded and screened at international festivals such as Toronto, Torino FF, Mostra de São Paulo, DocLisboa, Vila do Conde and IndieLisboa. In 2022 she created the production company Filmes da Mãe. This year, Inês participates in the Short Film Competition with her film Neko.

Jérôme Clément-Wilz

Filmmaker
Documentary Competition

Jérôme Clément-Wilz is a writer-director and cinematographer. His films have been selected at renowned film festivals such as Rotterdam, IDFA, Hot Docs or Clermont-Ferrand, etc. He was a finalist for the Palais de Tokyo Prize. He studied at UC Berkeley, Sciences Po Paris and La Fémis. He is a curator at the CNC, and a 2023-2024 resident at the Villa Médicis. This year, Jérôme participates in the Documentary Competition with her film This Is my Body.

Lazare Lazarus

Filmmaker
Short Film Competition

Prostitute and gardener, Lazare Lazarus is a queer artist based in Marseille. He tells the story of our struggling desires blending the Marseille landscape with erotic imaginings drawn from the archives of Mémoire des sexualités, an association where he has been working for several years. He also co-organizes BDSM parties at Mineshaft, a hard fetish leather club in the city. This year, Lazare participates in the Short Film Competition with her film Ghosts of Hard, chapter 2.

Luciana Merino

Filmmaker
Short Film Competition

Luciana Merino (1991) is a Chilean director and screenwriter, currently enrolled at Elías Querejeta Zine Eskola. She is interested in a hybrid cinema, putting into tension the margins of reality and its deviations. Her first short film, Al Sol, Lejos del Centro, premiered at the Berlinale Shorts competition in 2024. This year, Luciana participates in the Short Film Competition with her film Towards the Sun, Far from the Center.

Maarten de Schutter

Filmmaker
Documentary Competition

Maarten de Schutter (he/his) (1999) graduated from the Film Academy (NFA, Amsterdam) in 2024, studying Directing Documentary. He loves leftist cinema, losing football matches and is half Iranian. This year, Maarten participates in the Documentary Competition with his film My Sweet Child.

Maja Classen

Filmmaker
Queer Art Competition

Maja Classen studied American Studies, Psychology, and German Studies at the University of Hamburg. She also studied Directing at the Konrad Wolf Film Academy in Potsdam-Babelsberg in 2000. During her studies, she explored hybrid forms and the question of authenticity in cinema—something that continues to be reflected in her work today. Since graduating as a director in 2007, she has worked as a freelance filmmaker in Berlin. Since 2008, she has taught documentary filmmaking at various film and art schools. This year, Maja participates in the Queer Art Competition with her film Truth or Dare.

Photo: Katja Ruge

Pascal Viveros

Filmmaker
Short Film Competition

Pascal Viveros (Chile, 1997) is a filmmaker intrigued by digital image possibilities, exploring new ways to represent his surrounding landscapes. His work in Santiago's cinema theaters reflects a profound interest in programming and curation. His first short film, Al Sol, Lejos del Centro, premiered at the Berlinale Shorts competition in 2024. This year, Pascal participates in the Short Film Competition with her film Towards the Sun, Far from the Center.

Paula Tomás Marques

Filmmaker
Queer Focus

Paula Tomás Marques is a Portuguese filmmaker from Porto. Having completed a postgraduate degree in Filmmaking at Elías Querejeta Zine Eskola (San Sebastián, Spain), she previously did a postgraduate degree in Sociology at ISCTE (Lisbon), and was originally trained in Directing and Cinematography at Lisbon’s ESTC. In her films, she explores the difficulties her characters face when breaking or questioning expectations of gender and sexuality. This year, Paula participates in the Queer Focus with her film When We Dead Awaken.

Pol Merchan

Filmmaker
Queer Focus

Pol Merchan is an artist and filmmaker, curator at the Xposed Queer Film Festival and is a member of the Berlinale selection committee. Holding a Bachelor’s degree in Fine Arts and a Master’s degree in Art in Context, his work explores the intersection of historiography, autobiography, fiction, and documentary. His works have been exhibited internationally at art institutions and film festivals, including the MoMA, Museo Reina Sofía, Rotterdam Film Festival, Dok Leipzig, Hot Docs and Anthology Film Archives. This year, Pol participates in the Queer Focus with his film The Light that Covers the Wounds.

Photo: Jacintha Nolte

Raquel Melgue

Filmmaker
Gender Play

Raquel Melgue was born in Porto in 1985. She lives and works in Lisbon. She is a mixed-media visual artist whose work spans photography, video, and performance, and has been presented nationally and internationally since 2007, the year she was selected for the AIAS Prize of Honor in Zurich, Switzerland. Her career is defined by interdisciplinary collaborations with other artists. She holds a Master's degree in Visual Arts - Digital Intermedia (2012) and a Bachelor's degree in Visual Arts - Painting (2007) from the University of Évora. She collaborates with the Kindred Spirit gallery. Since 2016, she has created videos, visual materials, and stage spaces for Sónia Baptista's plays. This year, Raquel participates in the Gender Play strand with her film O Meu Reino para um King.

Rezmorah

Actress, Co-writer
"In My Shorts" Competition

Rezmorah is the protagonist and co-writer of Pedro Gonçalves Ribeiro's film Rezbotanik, which participates in this year's “In My Shorts” Competition.

Sara Fantova

Filmmaker
Feature Film Competition

Sara Fantova graduated from ESCAC (Barcelona) in 2018, specializing in Directing, with Don't Wake Me Up, a short film that premiered in the official selection of the Seminci Film Festival. She is also one of the eleven co-directors of La filla d’algú, collective feature film mentored by Sergi Pérez and awarded at the Málaga Film Festival. She has also co-directed the RTVE series This Is Not Sweden with Mar Coll and Aina Clotet. Currently, she is a professor at ESCAC. This year, Sara participates in the Feature Film Competition with her film Jone, Sometimes.

Saralisa Volm

Producer
Queer Art Competition

Saralisa Volm is the producer of the film Truth or Dare, participating this year in the Queer Art Competition.

Sónia Baptista

Filmmaker
Queer Focus

Sónia Baptista completed the Contemporary Dance Performer Course at Forum Dança. She earned, with distinction, a Master's Researcher degree in Choreography and Performance from the University of Roehampton in London. Her training was complemented by several dance, music, theater, and video workshops. She writes dramaturgical texts for other creators and choreographs for film, video, and theater. She has published eight books. She has collaborated with Fórum Dança, Eira, FOR, ESD, ESTC, and the University of Minho. She is a visiting professor at the University of Évora and an Associate Artist at AADK Portugal. This year, Sónia participates in the Gender Play strand with her film O Meu Reino para um King.

Photo: Raquel Melgue

Theo Jean Cuthand

Filmmaker
Queer Focus

Theo Jean Cuthand grew up in Saskatoon Saskatchewan and makes films about sexuality, madness, Queer identity and love, gender, and Indigeneity. He is of Plains Cree and Scots descent, a member of Little Pine First Nation, and resides in Toronto, Canada. This year, Theo participates in the Queer Focus with his film Dreams of Sunlight through Trees.