Ana María Lopez
2024-2025
François Chevalier Fellow
Universidad de Antioquia
Affective Turn in Colombian Documentary Cinema 2003-2023
Biography
Doctor in Latin American Studies from the University of Paris-Sorbonne and the University of Chile. In 2008, she was awarded a CONICYT scholarship by Chile for doctoral studies for Latin Americans. From 2014 to 2021, she served as a Full Professor at the Pontifical Bolivarian University, where she created the Master's program in Documentary Film and conducted research on documentary cinema in Colombia and Latin America. In 2021, she won a public merit competition held by the University of Antioquia, through which she joined as an Associate Professor in the Faculty of Communications and Philology. She is currently involved in the Audiovisual and Multimedia Communication program and the Master's in Creation and Audiovisual Studies.
She has made significant contributions to the field through her active participation as President of the Board of Directors of the Corporation of Documentary Filmmakers ALADOS Colombia from 2021 to 2024. She has worked on designing high-level training programs for prestigious universities and organizations. Among her recent notable publications are: "Narrative Displacements: In Contemporary Colombian Cinema on Conflict" published in Nuevo Texto Crítico, No. 28 (51), 233-248 (2015); the chapter “Documentary Film and Memory: When Life Becomes Film” in the book Representar las memorias: Conflicto, Paz y Memoria by the University of Antioquia Press (2021); “Audiovisual Production as Resistance: The Case of Muchachos a lo bien and Rostros y rastros” in the Revista Interamericana de Bibliotecología (2020); “Continuities and Changes in Political Memory Documentary Film in Latin America” as parto f Memoria política en perspectiva Latinoamericana published by Peter Lang (2019), in which she co-edited the book Countercultures and Subcultures in Latin American Cinema (1979-2015) with Sonia García, published by Tirant Humanidades. Recently, she published “Notes for an Assessment of Documentary Film in Colombia” (2023) in La Pesadilla de Nanook. She directed the documentary short film Borrowed Memories, Common Memories (2021), which premiered at the Bogotá International Documentary Showcase and was awarded at the Extramuros International Festival. She has also served as a jury member for showcases, festivals, and various calls for research, production, and audiovisual circulation., and audiovisual circulation.
Research project
The project "Affective Turn in Colombian Documentary Cinema 2003-2023" aims to explore the role of affects and emotions in Colombian documentary cinema over the past two decades. In contrast to the existing literature on studies of reality cinema, where emotions have been underestimated, this project seeks to understand how cinematic language is shaped in this pursuit and the social and political character of this cinematic expression in dialogue with the tradition of political documentary cinema in Latin America.
Documentary cinema, traditionally considered a social and political expression, underwent changes in the last decades of the 20th century and the early 21st century, in part due to the developments in motion picture production technologies but especially in Colombia due to political changes and primarily Film Law 814. For this reason, this research focuses on the period marked by the twenty years of the Law, from 2003 to 2023.
The productions of this period address themes such as personal narratives, political memories, the use of archival footage, relationships with territories, family histories, and motherhood, among others, which have redefined the documentary and raised questions about the relationship with reality and society. Subjectivity and the private sphere have gained relevance in productions previously oriented toward the public sphere, highlighting a strong presence of affective and emotional expressions in documentary cinema.
The research is framed in a transdisciplinary perspective that considers the capacity of documentary cinema to reflect and generate debates close to cultural studies, emphasizing the situated interpretation of cultural phenomena. The theoretical approach addresses the evolution of the concept of documentary, highlighting the emergence of the term "non fiction" as a category that allows for greater expressive freedom, incorporating the lives of characters, intimacy, and emotions.
This corpus challenges historical dichotomies that have associated emotional expressions with weakness, and thus, we work from the "affective turn" as an alternative to understanding historical dimensions and forms of writing related to the private sphere, the body, nature, feminism, and memory studies.
The project outlines clear objectives, including the analysis of a corpus composed of documentary works, the systematization of categories, the writing of findings, and the development of new knowledge products. The approval of the project by the University of Antioquia's Research System highlights the importance of contributing to the development of cinematic language and the understanding of contemporary society.
The project's methodology comprises an analytical-descriptive approach for studying the corpus and an experimental component based on audiovisual creation. The expected outcomes aim to enrich the theoretical and practical understanding of Colombian documentary cinema, contribute to knowledge in audiovisual practices, and advance the field. The dissemination of results is projected through participation in academic events, publication of articles, and the proposal of a workshop dedicated to film experimentation.
In summary, the project comprehensively addresses the evolution of Colombian documentary cinema from an affective perspective, challenging paradigms and proposing a novel approach that will enrich the academic and creative landscape in this field.
Selected publications
2024, ¡Oiga Vea! (1972): Hacer cine de lo invisible en el marco de los VI Juegos Panamericanos de 1971, IdeAs Ideés d´Amériques, 23, Doi: doi.org/10.4000/ideas.17222, Institut des Amériques.
2023. “Reflexión sobre el proceso de creación de la película Las razones del lobo”in Mundo imaginado y significado. Discursos contemporáneos y comunicación, pp. 83-98, Universidad Pontificia Bolivariana.
2022, Casa Abierta, in "Escribir, olvidar, regresar. Historias en borrador.", pp. 129-143, Editorial Universidad Pontificia Bolivariana - Universidad Nacional de Colombia.
2022, Toro-Tamayo, L. C., López Carmona, A. M. Londoño Roman, C., y Baena Toro, S. “La casa: un espacio de recuerdos. El archivo personal como forma para activar y construir la memoria”, in Memórias em tempos difíceis. wp.ufpel.edu.br/nemplus/files/2022/03/Memorias-em-tempos-dificeis.pdf, pp. 85-103, Coordenação: Maria Letícia Mazzucchi Ferreira [Recurso eletrônico] Porto
2020, La producción audiovisual como resistencia: el caso de Muchachos a lo bien y Rostros y rastros, Revista Interamericana De Bibliotecología, 43,2, pp. eI6/1 -eI6/9, Universidad de Antioquia.
2020, P. Golovátina-Mora, B. Sheridan, A. M. López Carmona; ,On Visual Walking Remembering Warmipura – Among Women,Cinéma&Cie,34, pp.101-114
