Arthur Balder

Director & Producer


Arthur Balder , director & producer of “Little Spain” (which was the first audiovisual work of his career), is also the director & producer of  the feature  “American Mirror: Intimations of Immortality”, starring Academy Award-winner Susan Sarandon, a film that has won until now  30+ awards, being part of the official selection of more than 50 film festivals  – only in 2019. 

As a filmmaker, Arthur Balder’s films have been honored with two consecutive Best Documentary of the Year awards by the Association of Latin Entertainment Critics of New York (2015 and 2016), as well as the Lady Of the Victory by the Critics Circle of Mexico (2015), the Michel Foucre Award for Best Director (6th Ierapetra International Film Festival, 2019); his films have won, among others, the Best Documentary Feature Film of the Jaipur International Film Festival (India, 2020), the Fabrique Du Cinema Award (Italy, 2018) for Best International Documentary (the jury was presided over by two-time Academy Award-winner Paul Haggis), the Grand Prix of the Prvi Kadar  International Film Festival in Sarajevo (Bosnia-Herzegovina, 2019), the Best Documentary Feature Film Award of the UK Film Festival (London, 2019), the Parajanov-Vartanov Award (Los Angeles, 2018), the Best of Festival Award of the Arlington Film Festival (2019), the Golden Iguana for Best Feature Documentary of the Guayaquil International Film Festival (Ecuador, 2019), a Special Jury Mention awarded by Melbourne Documentary Film Festival (Australia). The Hispanic Organization of Latin Actors of New York (HOLA) has honored him in 2016 with the Excellence in Documentary Filmmaking Award. In his films, he has sought from the set-out to defy the boundaries between documentary and fiction.

Additionally, his films have garnered official selections, nominations, and/or wins, among others,  at Carthage Film Festival (Oscar-qualifying), Black Nights Film Festival of Tallinn (FIAPF competitive feature-length), Parajanov-Vartanov Institute of Los Angeles, Gijon International Film Festival (Spain, Official Selection 2015, FIAPF competitive), Milano Film Festival (part of the official selection The Outsiders 2019), DOC LA (Documentary Film Festival of Los Angeles), Ierapetra International Film Festival (Crete, Greece, winner of Audience Award 2019), Peak City International Film Festival (winning Best Director of a Feature 2019), Chichester International Film Festival, Golden Door International Film Festival (Jersey City), Near Nazareth Film Festival (winner Best Documentary in 2019), Asti Film Festival (winner Premio Giura international competition ASTIDOC, 2019), Orlando Film Festival (winner of the Arts in Focus Award 2019), Blow-Up Chicago Arthouse Film Festival (Finalist Best Documentary, Best Actress and Best Cinematography), and have screened at such iconic venues as Egyptian Theater, American Cinematheque (Los Angeles) the Martin Gropius Bau (Berlin) and the main theatres of the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA).

As a writer, he authored nine fiction novels, all of them published and distributed before 2014, among other major houses, by Penguin Random House, Mondadori, Albin Michel in Europe and across Latin America.

“‘Little Spain’ shows Balder’s mastery”

Donald Kuspit, Ph.D.

“”(…)Little Spain shows that a documentary film need not be simplistically descriptive, but can be an aesthetic feat respecting the subtlety of the “moving” medium. Editing is a creative activity, a matter of aesthetics as well as informational choices; Balder’s documentary is a work of art, moving subtly between different situations and individuals, showing their relationship with formal acumen as well as empirical accuracy. “Little Spain” is a kind of masterpiece, in that it masters its subject matter even as it shows Balder’s mastery of his medium..”

 

YOU CAN READ THE ARTICLE IN SPANISH ON SPAIN’S LEADING CULTURAL MAGAZINE ‘EL CULTURAL’:

La Little Spain de Artur Balder