SANDRA BALSELLS

She was born in Barcelona (Spain) in 1966.

In 1989, after finishing her degree in Journalism at the Facultad de Ciencias de la Información (School of Communication Studies) of the Universidad Autónoma of Barcelona, and completing photography studies at the Instituto de Estudios Fotográficos de Cataluña, (Institute of Photographic Studies of Catalonia) she moved to London, where she lived for three years, beginning her professional career as a photojournalist.

There, she was awarded a grant for a Post-Graduate Diploma in Photojournalism at the London College of Printing, which she combined with various work placements in the British press (The Guardian and The Times). In summer 1991, coinciding with the start of the disintegration of Yugoslavia, she travelled to the Balkans for the first time, after reaching an agreement to collaborate with The Times, covering the outbreak of the Serbo-Croat war.

From then on, and up to the end of 2000, her professional career focussed on the Balkans where she completed a large number of articles. She was witness to many of the most significant episodes of the last decade, collaborating with national and international media.

Among her outstanding achievements from this time is her work with the television documentary Dying for the Truth, made for the British broadcaster Channel 4 in 1994; she was also awarded a grant by the FotoPres '97 exhibition; part of her work was put on show in the IX International Photojournalism Festival "Visa pour l'Image", held in Perpignan (France) in 1997; and she took part in numerous national and international conferences and debates.

In 2002 she publishes the book Balkan in memoriam, an extensive photographic route through the old Yugoslavia that gathers part of her work.

She has shown her work in over fifty individual and collective exhibitions, and her photos have been published in many different newspapers and magazines, such as The New York Times, The Toronto Star, The Observer, Today, The Evening Standard, La Vanguardia, El Mundo, Woman, Avui, El Temps, etc. She has also completed photographic pieces on Israel, Palestine, Mexico, Rumania, Canada, Cuba, Sicily, Haiti and Mozambique in collaboration with various publications and humanitarian organisations.

Since 1995, she has combined her work as a photojournalist with teaching at the Facultad de Ciencias de la Comunicación Blanquerna (the Blanquerna School of Communication Studies) at Ramon Llull University.