01Film trilogy2017–2026
ESCinema, sound art and research brought into a single practice of inter-fiction and material memory.
01
Selected works
Films, installations and auralworks developed as connected forms of research.
02Auralwork2023
Forensic Acoustics 1
04Short documentary2016
Limbo
12′View
03Essay · Theory2024
Ethno☰hauntology Manifesto
Rafael Ramírez / Oderay Ponce de León / Carlos T. Vargas
Spanish versionRead · Rialta Read · PDF
05Multichannel work2025
This Terrible Century
12′ · Henry Dunant MuseumInstallation
06Ethno☰hauntological Matrix2026
La Reconcentración
6 hours · Work in progressTransmedia
02
About the Work
The concerns running through Rafael Ramírez’s films regarding the relations between language and world demand—and find—a cinematic expression capable of challenging every limit imposed on film language. That ambition, markedly metaphysical, places his work in a singular position within Cuban audiovisual experience. In Winter Campaigns, staging, visuality, music and montage weave a corporeal, spectral and unstable syntax, prepared to sacrifice the standard grammar of cinematic narration in favor of the rhetorical possibilities of its expressive resources. These are works conceived as laboratories of language, questioning cinema’s established forms with sufficient radicalism to occupy its borders and place its generic identity under tension.
03
Complete index
Selected Festivals & Venues
- Locarno Film Festival
- IFF Rotterdam
- DocLisboa
- IDFA
- FIC Valdivia
- Mar del Plata International Film Festival
- Frames of Representation
- DocumentaMadrid
- MAFIZ
- FestCurtas
- Frontera Sur
- Neighboring Scenes
- Festival Internacional del Nuevo Cine Latinoamericano
- Muestra Joven ICAIC
- Yale Film Festival
- Munich Student Film Festival
- Almacén de la Imagen
- DOCMA (personal retrospective)
- Cortos Cali
- documenta fifteen Kassel
- Irida Visions Athens
- e-flux Events New York
- Henry Dunant Museum
- Festival Panalandia
WorkFieldYearDurationAccess / Status
Etno☰hauntología. Espectros de la imagen y territorios aurales (with O. P. L. and C. T. V.)Essay · Theory2024—Read
Technical sheetFilm · 2010 · 5′31″
04Auralworks. Sound-art projects by Rafael Ramírez
Tsarichina
Institute of Acoustic Ruins
05
OST / Music for Films
Selected films featuring original music composed by Rafael Ramírez.
Mi sangre es petróleo · Vania Quevedo · 2026
Festival Internacional de Cine de Morelia
El regresado · Armando Capó · 2026
Miami Film Festival · Guadalajara International Film Festival · Havana Film Festival New York · AFI Silver DC Caribbean FilmFest
El Cayo de la Muerte (1958) · Lobos de mar (1955) · Collaboration with Archivistas Salvajes · 2025
Cinéma du Réel — Cuba: Undergrounds · Cineteca Madrid — Archivistas Salvajes
La historia se escribe de noche · Alejandro Alonso · 2024
IFF Rotterdam · DocumentaMadrid · DokuFest · Minikino Film Week · L’Alternativa · INSTAR Film Festival
La tierra de la ballena · Armando Capó · 2024
Festival Internacional del Nuevo Cine Latinoamericano de La Habana · Havana Film Festival New York · Festival Internacional de Cine de Gibara · Festival de la Crítica Cinematográfica de Caracas
Matar a un hombre · Orlando Mora · 2024
LEFFEST · Festival Internacional del Nuevo Cine Latinoamericano de La Habana · ÍCARO · Chicago Latino Film Festival · Festival de Cine Global de Santo Domingo · Skyline Benidorm Film Festival · Cinélatino / Rencontres de Toulouse · FÀCYL · Trinidad+Tobago Film Festival · Vancouver Latin American Film Festival
Tartessos Dune · Josué G. Gómez · 2023
Festival Internacional del Nuevo Cine Latinoamericano de La Habana · MIDBO · MAMUT Festival de Memoria Audiovisual · INSTAR Film Festival
Tundra · José Luis Aparicio · 2021
Curta Cinema · Sundance · Miami Film Festival · Santa Fe International Film Festival · Pendance · San Diego Latino Film Festival · Houston Latino Film Festival · BAFICI · Fantaspoa · New Jersey International Film Festival · NYC Independent Film Festival · Seattle Latino Film Festival
Nara · Rosa María Rodríguez · 2021
Festival Internacional del Nuevo Cine Latinoamericano de La Habana
Entre perro y lobo · Irene Gutiérrez · 2020
Berlinale Forum · Gijón International Film Festival · Las Palmas International Film Festival · Third Horizon Film Festival · Trinidad+Tobago Film Festival
Centella · Claudia Claremi · 2019
Ji.hlava IDFF · Philadelphia Latino Arts & Film Festival · Trinidad+Tobago Film Festival · Santiago International Film Festival
El proyecto · Alejandro Alonso · 2017
Visions du Réel · DOK Leipzig · DocumentaMadrid · BIFF Colombia · Lima Indie · Havana Film Festival · Cine Las Americas · documenta fifteen
06
Practice
Rafael Ramírez is a Cuban filmmaker, sound artist and writer based in Athens. He studied Audiovisual Communication at the Instituto Superior de Arte in Havana and later specialised in documentary filmmaking at the Escuela Internacional de Cine y TV de San Antonio de los Baños.
His films move between cinema of the real and fiction, while incorporating procedures drawn from experimental cinema and the essay film. They emerge from processes of research and writing in which anthropology, science fiction, philosophical essay and sound art converge within the same cinematic construction. The document is never treated as fully legible evidence; it is brought into contact with apocryphal narratives, imaginary archives, esoteric systems of knowledge and materials produced by obsolete technologies.
Teaching
- Current
- Founder and Director, RiaLMaster’s Programme in AI and Cinema of the Real
- Since 2024
- ProfessorInstituto de Cine de Madrid, Spain
- 2023–2025
- ProfessorUniversity of O’Higgins, Chile
- Since 2020
- Director of the INTERZONA Master’s ProgrammeEscuela Internacional de Cine y TV de San Antonio de los Baños, Cuba
- 2017–2020
- Professor and Coordinator of the Humanities DepartmentEscuela Internacional de Cine y TV de San Antonio de los Baños, Cuba
- 2009–2013
- ProfessorFine Arts Academy El Alba, Cuba
- 2008–2013
- ProfessorInstituto Superior de Arte / University of the Arts, Cuba
His teaching has involved students from screenwriting, editing, cinematography and sound, as well as the documentary and fiction directing fields. He has also worked as a visiting professor and project adviser at film schools, universities and independent educational programmes in Latin America and Europe.
