Director, Writer and Producer at AFIN

Biography

Nicolás P. Villarreal was born and raised in La Plata, Argentina. He studied at the Escuela de Animación y Cinematografía de Avellaneda where he earned a degree in 2D Animation. While studying animation, he was taken under the wing of Miguel Alzugaray, a well-known fine artist from Argentina. He continued studying animation and fine art painting until he entered the Master’s Program at the Academy of Art University in San Francisco. Villarreal graduated with honors in the Spring of 2002, and since then he has been working as a traditional animator, character designer, sculptor and Visual Development artist for films and video games including Walt Disney Studios, Sony Computer Entertainment, Jim Henson Studios, Sega, Reel FX, Digital Domain, Duncan Studios, and Amazon Studios among others. He has given presentations at Pixar Animation Studios, Dreamworks Animation, Apple, Stanford University, The Sydney Opera House, and several universities in South America and Europe as well as a TEDx talk. In 2020 Nicolás was featured in VOGUE Latin America as one of the creative minds of Latin America. Nicolás is the co-founder of Red Clover Studios where he is currently developing his first Feature Film as well as the writer and director of the awarded animated short films “Pasteurized”, “Nieta”, "ON/OFF", “The House of Colors” and the live-action short film “Things are looking up”. His films have won over 400 International Awards including  Best Animated Film at the Toronto Kids International Film Festival in 2015.He is also the Executive Director of the Visual Development and Traditional Animation Department at the Academy of Art University in San Francisco, where he teaches film and animation design.