Emilien Awada

* 1988

Émilien Awada is a director and cinematographer.

He studied film and visual arts at Sorbonne Nouvelle and Paris 8, and trained in documentary film directing at La Fémis. During his university studies, he directed commissioned films for television and cultural institutions. Since 2014, he has collaborated with artists and filmmakers on documentaries, artist films, and installations shown at international festivals and art centres.

He wrote and directed (with Constanze Ruhm) Panoramis Paramount Paranormal, a series of short films and multimedia installations (Berlinale 2015; FID 2016; Transmediale 2017). Between 2020 and 2024 he shot and edited several artist films produced under the New Patrons programme (Nouveaux Commanditaires). As a cinematographer he has worked on short, medium, and feature-length documentaries, among them Quinzaine Claire (Adrien Genoudet, Entrevues Belfort 2016), Pollock & Pollock (Isabelle Rèbre, Silver FILAF 2021), and Un automne sans elle (Isabelle Putod, in post-production).

Since 2018 he has led workshops on documentary filmmaking and cinematography at Paris 8, the École des arts de la Sorbonne (Paris 1), Artagon in Pantin, and the master's programme of the Documentary School in Lussas.

He is currently directing his first feature, Onions to Forget the Past, produced by Darjeeling with The Attic Productions (Beirut) with the support of AFAC, the Doha Film Institute, and the CNC.