Maria Valenzuela Rivas

Maria Valenzuela Rivas is a 21 years old Performing Arts and Cinema student who has directed and wrote "OC-Down, But Not Out" (whose original title is "Tocada y hundida") a short film that has been one of the eight winners of the second edition of the competition CIMA10 (2024), organized by CIMA and Prime Video Spain.

She is a passionate of storytelling who has been honored winning different prizes through years related to writing, such us in the call made by the Reteena Festival in 2022 (Audiovisual Laboratory), in the second edition of ConCurts Jove (award in the Baccalaureate and CF category)  in 2021, in the Quantum Poetic Action Awards convened within the framework of Science Needs You events (first prize) in 2019, in the XIV edition of the educational experiences award Josep Pallach (short story award) in 2018 and in the micro-story contest promoted by the ByL·InEdu Association (award in the children's category by jury decision) in 2015, among others.

She also was selected to go to work on one of her projects in Konvent's Writing Residence (Berguedà, Barcelona) during the month of August of 2023.

Other than this, she has been formed in Musical Language (sol-fa) from 2009 to 2018 and has been playing to drums since she was six years old. She has also learned transverse flute for some years, and has took drawing and painting lessons. She loves learning new things, and that's what made her participate in different workshops. Some of them were: "Keys from genre’s perspective to create a new point of view of stories" (CIMA, María Castejón – 2023, October), "Short narrative course" (Ateneu Barcelonès Writing School – 2022, November-December) or "Initiation to make-up" (ERAM – 2022, May) among others.