Exotic: of foreign origin, not native, introduced from abroad. In the djemaa or town square in Marrakech, tourists and locals mingle at sunset. Exótico/Exotic explores in a humorous tone the new border that seems to reflect the true class structure of the globalised society, the line between tourists and people who will never be able to travel abroad. The line that separates those who will never leave their country from those who enjoy visiting countries that seem to be more authentic, maybe cheaper, certainly more exotic than the places they live in. Especially more exotic.
Elia Urquiza (Pamplona, 1979). Elia made her first documentary, De Carmen a Carmen, within her Master’s Programme in Creative Documentary Film at the Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB). Since then, she has written, shot, and edited many films, often at the crossroads of documentary and fiction. In 2005, she took part in the group documentary project Entre el dictador y yo. In 2006, she paid tribute to two of her favourite directors, Victor Erice and Abbas Kiarostami, in Historia de un niño, shown in their exhibition at Barcelona’s Centre de Cultura Contemporània (CCCB). Granted a scholarship from Fundación “la Caixa” in 2007, she entered the Film Directing Programme at CalArts, the California Institute of the Arts, where she was able to tap into fiction film. In 2010, she got a grant from Navarra’s Government to complete here graduate studies in Los Angeles, under the tutorship of Monte Hellman.