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A scene from the film "Danzak" |
Alumna Wins Austin Film Festival Award
Peruvian film "Danzak" named Best Narrative Student Short
AUSTIN, Texas -Oct. 24, 2008- Gabriela Yepes (M.F.A. Radio-Television-Film, '08) earned the Narrative Student Short Film Award for writing and directing "Danzak" Oct. 18 at the 2008 Austin Film Festival.
The film tells the story of Nina, a 10-year-old girl whose life dramatically changes when she is asked to fulfill her dying father's last wish.
Yepes produced the film as her thesis, which was inspired by "The Agony of Rasu Ñiti," a short story by Peruvian writer José María Arguedas. The film also earned the "Some Farmers" TVR Craiova Award at the 10th Slatioara Film Festival in Romania.
Yepes and Naiti Gamez (M.A. Radio-Television-Film, '07), director of photography, earned two 2007 Teresa Lozano Long Graduate Study Abroad Travel Grants to produce the film in Peru.
Yepes, who minored in Latin American studies, recently earned another grant to start research and development on a documentary film about the impact of global warming on indigenous communities in the southern Peruvian Andes.
Contact:
Paloma Diaz
Senior Program Coordinator, Teresa Lozano Long Institute of Latin American Studies
512-232-2409
p.diaz@austin.utexas.edu
Jessica Sinn
Public Affairs Specialist, College of Liberal Arts
512-471-2404
jt1221@mail.utexas.edu