
NILOOFAR ASADI
Filmmaker and Visual Storyteller
Niloofar Asadi, born in Tehran in 1983, is an Iranian independent filmmaker and visual storyteller based in San Francisco. Exploring character-driven stories by evoking a human view of the characters' emotions and motives with the power of visual storytelling lies at the core of her artistic mission. Her work signifies existential themes like remembrance, presence, time, trauma, and death, focusing on the individuals' power and vulnerabilities yet de-emphasizing the social identities they perform.
By portraying the characters in a state of crisis, she positions the viewer in an uncomfortable circumstance of witnessing suffering and pain, and exposes them to the existential and psychological states of the characters, and seeks to provoke complex feelings and responses, whether self-reflective or sympathetic, in the viewer. To craft these settings, she adopts a subjective approach and draws particularly upon her own experiences to manifest how a character's response in the face of a disaster, whether vulnerability or resilience, reshapes the individual's identity.
Niloofar's vision in pursuit of a universal voice, yet with a strong local accent, is largely shaped by her experiences of displacement and her endeavor to redefine her artistic identity in the cultural landscape of the host society. Having experienced suppression and censorship as a female artist in a patriarchal society back in Iran, she has always maintained a critical perspective on dominant societal and cultural trends.
In 2012, she founded AG91 as a creative platform for film-making, theatrical performances, and visual arts. Working with different media and experimenting with various visual forms has given Niloofar a distinctive visual eloquence, which continues to enrich the visual language of her films. Since her migration to the US in 2015, she has kept expanding her universal visual storytelling language and rejects the standard casting of a middle eastern artist with an imposed focus defined by the dominant trends.
Niloofar has an MFA degree in Motion Pictures and Television, with an emphasis in directing, from the Academy of Art University in San Francisco. She started her professional career in 2002, and since then, she has worked as a director, writer, producer, and visual storyteller in various artistic settings.
Her short films are selected and awarded by international film festivals, like Palm Springs International Short Film Festival, Prague International Film Awards, and Africa Human Rights Film Festival.

"I narrate stories
that motivate us to sympathize with people who face complexities."
AWARDS
OFFICIAL SELECTION
AFRICA
HUMAN RIGHTS
FILM FESTIVAL
2021
2022 Future Art Award
MOZAIK
2022
OFFICIAL SELECTION
PRAGUE
INTERNATIONA
FILM AWARDS
2021
MARKETPLACE
PALM SPRINGS INTERNATIONAL SHORT FILM FESTIVAL
2022
NOMINEE
BEST PICTURES
NEXTUP
FILM FESTIVAL
2021
BEST SHORT
DOCUMENTRY
NEXTUP
FILM FESTIVAL
2021
COVER
AWARD
ESTI Magazine
2022
The Cypress Tree
Feature Film, Development, 2023.
Gordāfarīd
Short Film, Mozaik, Future Art award, 2022.
Behind me, No wind
Short Documentary, 2022.
Woman. Life. Freedom
Photography Series, ESTI Magazine, Cover, November 2022.
LampLight
Short Film, Palm Springs International Short Film Festival, 2022.
Marketplace.
In Pursuit of Freedom
Best Short Documentary, NXT Up Film Festival, 2021.
Official selection, Short Documentary; Africa Human Rights Film Festival, 2021.
Best editing, Nominee; NXT UP Film Festival, 2021.
Presence
Official Selection, Best short movie; Prague International Film Awards 2021.
Best editing, Nominee; NXT UP Film Festival, 2021.
Reflection
Photo Exhibition; The Laundry, San Francisco, California, 2019.
Witness
Photo Exhibition; Metreon, San Francisco, California, 2018.
Friday
Theatrical play, Village Theater, and Art Gallery,
Danville, California, 2018.
YOURK OPERA
Theatrical play, Buriel Clay Theatre,
San Francisco, California, 2017.