Sonia Herman Dolz

Life and work

Dolz is the daughter of the economist Herman Dolz and visual artist Dora Dolz, who came with her parents to the Netherlands at the age of three. She grew up in Rotterdam and studied Spanish language and literature at the University of Leiden. She also studied film and directing at the Free Academy in The Hague, where she graduated in 1994.

Since 1993 she has been working as a filmmaker, screenwriter, photographer and occasionally as a producer, camera-woman and sound-woman. Between 1993 and 1996 she also worked as a documentary maker for the VPRO program Diogenes, and since then she works on her own films.

In 1993, she broke through internationally with her first feature documentary "Romance de Valentía" about the Spanish bullfighting, which was awarded at several European film festivals. Her film "Lagrimas Negras" (1997) about the Cuban old timers band Vieja Trova Santiaguera, won multiple awards, and anticipated Wim Wenders' Buena Vista Social Club, (1999). Sonia's subsequant documentaries include "The Master and His Pupil" about the Russian conductor Valery Gergiev, and filmic portraits of the Dutch folk singer Frédérique Spigt, and Sonia's mother, artist Dora Dolz.

Sonia's work is distinguished several times among others with the Golden Calf Special Jury Prize in 1998; as the best documentary at the Golden Prague Festival 2003; as best documentary at the Bergen International Film Festival in 2004; and with the Pendrecht Culture Prize in 2007 in Rotterdam.

Honors

Romance de Valentía, 1993

Lágrimas Negras, 1997

Yo soy así, 2000

Master and His Pupil, 2003

Filmography, a selection