On the passing of Fernanda Silva, director of Festroia – International Film Festival
The Festroia Cultural Association regrets to inform of the departure of its president Fernanda Silva, today, August 3rd, 2016, at 59 years of age.
Born in 1957, Fernanda Silva graduated in Public Relations and Administration, beginning her professional activity as board assistant at the Tróia Tourist Complex.
In 1988, she joined the crew of the Tróia International Film Festival, created three years earlier by Mário Ventura Henriques. She worked as a secretary and PR for the event before becoming general coordinator, in 1993, and festival director, in 1995, a position that she held for two decades, until the 30th and last edition of Festroia, in 2014.
In June 2006, she was the first person from the institutional world of Portuguese film to be invited to the European Film Academy (EFA), with voting rights in the annual election of the best European films.
Member of international juries in several film festivals – San Sebastián (Spain), Venice (Italy), Karlovy Vary (Czech Republic) or Mumbai (India), for example –, between 2001 and 2003 she was a Member of the Board of the European Coordination of Film Festivals and, from 2007 to 2009, she was Member of the Board of the Confédération Internationale des Cinémas d’Art-et-d’Essai (CICAE).
In April this year, in one of her last public appearances, the director of Festroia was at the opening of the "Mário Ventura and Fernanda Silva" film-projection room at the Escola Secundária Lima de Freitas, in Setúbal, a facility that is part of the National Film Plan, promoted by the General-Direction of Education of Portugal, the Portuguese Institute of Cinema and Audio Visual and the Portuguese Cinematheque-Film Museum.
The Funeral will be on the 5th of August.
The Cultural Organization Festroia
11.08.2016 | Editor's blog
Cat. : Fest directors