Daniel Diez Castrillo

He participated in the Literacy Campaign, being recognized as a teacher in the Sierra Maestra. The experience he had with the inhabitants of the mountains would later become a motivation for the creation of Televisión Serrana[2]. He completed secondary education at the Osvaldo Herrera School of Communications and later enrolled at the University of La Habana, where he graduated as a journalist.

Professional Career
In 1967 he joined the Cuban Institute of Cinematographic Arts and Industries (ICAIC), where he worked for 15 years as a sound technician, music producer, and journalist in more than 500 ICAIC Latinoamericano newscasts, and in about 50 documentaries, alongside the prestigious filmmaker Santiago Álvarez. He also was part of the journalistic delegations of the ICAIC Latinoamericano Newscast that participated in several international events.

In 1981 he began working at the Cuban Institute of Radio and Television (ICRT), as a director and documentarian, producing news programs, sports programs, dramatized shows and magazines, and producing about 90 documentaries. He was vice president for Artistic Creation at ICRT from 2001 to 2006, and participated in the creation of CH-TV Channel (later Habana Channel).

Creator and founder of Televisión Serrana, he directed this project from 1993 to 2002, simultaneously carrying out documentary work and initiating other important initiatives such as the Center for Studies in Community Communication, the Video-Letter (a means for exchange between communities and cultures), and the Alternative Audiovisual Creation Groups.

He served as a lecturer and jury member at various international events and film festivals, among which those in Guatemala, Mexico, Bolivia, Brazil, and La Habana stand out. He has also developed prolific academic work as a professor of sound, editing, directing, and other specialties, both in Cuba and in Argentina, Bolivia, Ecuador, Guatemala, Mexico, Venezuela, and other countries.

He is a documentary filmmaker at ICRT, teaches classes at the Faculty of Journalism at the University of La Habana and at the Institute of Superior Art, and is an advisor for workshops at the International School of Film and Television in San Antonio de los Baños.

In 2015 he was awarded the National Television Prize[3]

Works
Among the most significant documentaries he has created are:

Stampede.
From America I Am Born… I Owe Myself to It.
And the Sky Was Taken by Assault.
The Sun Cannot Be Hidden with a Finger, (Santiago Álvarez).
About a First Battle (Octavio Cortázar).
Arcaño and His Wonders (Oscar Valdés).
Circling Cuba (Bernabé Hernández).
4000 Children (Fernando Pérez).
The Hour of the Pigs.
Breaking the Routine.
Let's See What Comes Out.
Report on a Song.
Luanda Is No Longer from San Pablo.
The Force of the People.
Wood.
Free Time at the Rock.
The Momotombo Began to Rumble.
26 Is Also 19.
Miners.
At a Gallop Through History.
Within the body of works of Televisión Serrana, among many others, the following materials bear his signature:

Elections.
Candelaria de Bueycito.
San Pablo de Yao.
Land of Love.
Pure Image.
March of the Torches.
Testimony of Pedro Gómez.
A Powerful Affection.
Like a Drop of Water.
Video-Letter to Bolivia.
The Earth Shaken.
Knowing Oneself.
Pinares de Mayarí.
Peasant's Day.
Historic Bayamo.
Dream No More.
Green SOS.
Villa Santo Domingo.
Victorino de Guisa.
From This Side of the River.
Announcing.
Josefa and José.
Original from Manzanillo.
Let the Community Lend You a Hand.
One Year Later.
Video-Letter to the Balearic Islands.
Fish Fry.
Video-Letter to Guatemala.
A Campaign of Tenderness.
Between Cultures.
Pulper.
The Cutting.
Holy Crusade.
The Borer.
Award-winning on multiple occasions in national and international competitions, he is a member of different institutions such as:

Union of Writers and Artists of Cuba (UNEAC).
Union of Journalists of Cuba (UPEC).
National Video Movement (MNV).
Latin American Council of Film and Video of Indigenous Peoples (CLAPCI).
Awards and Honors
His works have received awards from various competitions, organizations, and entities, such as the National Video Movement, the "Nature and Mankind" Foundation, the Video Festival of the National Museum of Natural History, the Federation of Cuban Women, and UNEAC (Caracol Prize).

In December 2011 he received the "Cameras of Diversity" Award, sponsored by the Regional Office of the United Nations Organization for Education, Science and Culture (UNESCO), in collaboration with the Foundation of New Latin American Cinema (FNCL), for his research project "Televisión Serrana: A Community Audiovisual Experience".

In 2015 he was honored with the National Television Prize.

At the international level he obtained, among others:

The Prize at the North-South encounter (Geneva, 1990) for the documentary "Sublime Profession of Love," and the Honor Mention "Grand Prix" (Berlin, 1991), for the same title.
Best Documentary (CBU) Caribbean Broadcasting Union (1997), for "A Powerful Affection".
Best Documentary Latin America "4th International Video Olympics" (South Africa, 1998), for "Like a Drop of Water," and Second Prize at the Youth Video Festival in The Hague (Holland, 1999).
He holds, among other honors:

The Distinction for National Culture (1996).
The Juan Marinello Order.
The Félix Elmuza Distinction.
The status of Artist of Merit of ICRT.
National Television Prize for lifetime achievement (2015).