Members
Zara Zandieh – Writer und Director
Zara Zandieh (they/she) is a filmmaker born and based in Berlin. Zara studied 4 years at the Berlin based self-tought and self-organized film school, filmArche. In 2018 Zara graduated as a master student of Art and Media at the University of the Arts Berlin (Universität der Künste Berlin).
The stories told through Zara’s projects are dedicated to a decolonial queer gaze that weaves complexities and multi-layered representations of post-migrant and marginalized subjects into poetic narratives.
Zara’s works have been nominated for awards at various film festivals including International Short Film Festival Oberhausen, BFI FLARE Film Festival, HIFF-Helsinki International Film Festival, EIFF-Edinburgh International Film Festival, Queer Lisboa, Inside Out and DokLeipzig. Zara’s most current project, OCTAVIA’S VISIONS, was recommended for a Research Fellowship of the Berlin Senate Department for Culture & Europe in 2019. OCTAVIA’S VISIONS premiered at the 67th International Short Film Festival Oberhausen and won the ZONTA Prize. It will be shown in September 2021 at the Humboldt Forum Berlin. In 2020 Zara received a Rosa Luxemburg Foundation research grant for FIGHTING THIS DESPAIR WITH JOY, a fiction-documentary project (in development). Zara was selected for the 2021 edition of Berlinale Talents.
