Santiago FOUZ HERNÁNDEZ
2020-2021
François Chevalier fellow
Durham University, UK
The films of Bigas Luna
Santiago Fouz Hernández is a Professor in Hispanic Studies and Film Studies at Durham University, UK, where he has been based since 1999. He has also been a visiting scholar at the Universities of Queensland, CUNY Graduate Center, Harvard, California Berkeley and Pittsburgh. He holds an MA and a PhD from the University of Newcastle upon Tyne and a degree from Santiago de Compostela University. He is the author of Cuerpos de cine (Bellaterra, 2013), co-author (with Alfredo Martínez-Expósito) of Live Flesh: The Male Body in Contemporary Spanish Cinema (I. B. Tauris, 2007) and editor of five books including El legado cinematográfico de Bigas Luna (Tirant lo Blanch, 2020), Spanish Erotic Cinema (Edinburgh University Press, 2017) and Mysterious Skin (I. B. Tauris, 2009). He is an editorial board member of Studies in Spanish and Latin American Cinemas. Since 2015 he coordinates (with Betty Bigas).The Bigas Luna Tribute, a series of international retrospectives and exhibitions to promote his legacy.
Projet de recherche
Santiago Fouz Hernández is completing a monograph on Spanish filmmaker Bigas Luna. The book is the culmination of a longer project on the history of eroticism in Spanish film that has already produced three edited collections. It will be the first English-language monograph on this important filmmaker and also the first to prioritise the sensual/sensorial relationship between the film and the viewer that is so clearly encouraged by his work. The project is informed by the concepts of ‘haptic visuality’ and ‘tactile desire’ drawing on ideas originally articulated by Nöel Burch but considerably developed by Linda Williams, Laura Marks or Vivian Sobchack. The book will also explore the socio-historical contexts of the films as well as their critical reception at home and internationally. Ultimately, the book aims to demonstrate that the films of Bigas Luna are an ideal case study to understand and illustrate the evolution of erotic cinema in Spain from the 1970s until now.
Sélection de publications
- El legado cinematográfico de Bigas Luna (Madrid: Tirant lo Blanch, 2020).
- Spanish Erotic Cinema (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2017).
- Cuerpos de cine. Masculinidades carnales en el cine y la cultura popular contemporáneos (Barcelona: Bellaterra, 2013).
- Fouz-Hernández, S. and A. Martínez-Expósito, Live Flesh: The Male Body in Contemporary Spanish Cinema (London and New York: I. B. Tauris, 2007).