Pituka Ortega-Heilbron

Pituka Ortega, born in 1960 in Panama, began to work in the cinema because of her passion to tell stories. When she directed the former magazine Década (1989-1994), he also worked as columnist and as short story writer. Pituka, as many people who wants to make film and documentaries, began in the advertising. She worked in the pre-production stage, where obviously the screenplay is designed, this Panamanian woman is graduated from the Inmaculata College (Florida, USA, 1982) in history and political science.

She worked between 1983 and 1984 in publicity reproduction, and from 1989 and 1994 as editor, writer and magazine director. To take part in Image and Sound Center (Centro de Imagen y sonido, CIMAS) together with Edgar Soberón Torchía and Enrique Castro, offers her new possibilities, which led her in 1994 to receive an workshop in screenplay writing at the International Film and Television School of San Antonio de los Baños (Escuela Internacional de Cine y Telivisión de San Antonio de los Baños, EICTV), in Cuba, with the writer Gabriel García Márquez.

As part of CIMAS policy to achieve acceptation and comprehension of its project of work from the civil society the image of self representation, it is made India Dormida (1994), a documentary with narrative elements, of which Ortega is co-producer and co-screenwriter with Edgar Soberón. This short film would be awarded after its release with the National Documentary – Video Prize of the National Culture Institute.

It shows the difficulties which face all those that in Panama have the goal of working as artists and particularly as filmmakers. Códigos de Silencio (1995) is the result of the necessity to talk about the difficult theme of free expression. As screenwriter and co-producer of this documentary, Pituka shows her commitment without demagogy about the social problems of her time.

Her admiration by Isabel de Obaldía, a Panamanian woman painter and sculptor, take the filmmaker to film the documentary Semblanza (1996, video), in which Pituka with a home video camera films with patience the creative work of the painter. Between 1997 and 1998 Pituka directs, writes and produces El Mandado. Again Pituka showed her personal commitment with social issues, for which the film and video are indispensable tool.

El corazón de las mujeres de piedra (documentary short film, video, 1998) talks about the work of legal assistance performed by a non- governmental organization to the women victims of discrimination or/and abuse. El Canal de Panamá: la octava maravilla del mundo (1998), a cable television production of Discovery Channel counted on Pituka Ortega to coordinate the executive production.

Recently Pituka Ortega has finished and edited her short feature film Sacrifictum (digital video finished in 35 mm). The filmmaker has amply demonstrated her talent and determination to give the incipient Panamanian cinema a place and a position inside the country and abroad. At present the filmmaker, together with others people interested in launching the Panamanian film, is involved in the process of creating an independent company for the production, filming, commercialization and marketing of Panamanian and Latin American independent films.