Introducing Our 2025 Los Fellows!
We at PHLAFF are excited to announce our 2025 Los Fellows! For our upcoming fellowship cycle, we’ll be incubating the projects of six Latine creatives which will present their work as a part of PHLAFF programming at the completion of the fellowship. Learn more about our six fellows below.
Alisha Miranda
Alisha Miranda is a Philadelphia-based Puerto Rican journalist covering food, drinks, and culture. In 2022, she founded #LatinxIndustryNight as a cultural production series to spotlight underrepresented Hispanic and Latinx bar pros. In 2023, she was part of the James Beard Journalism Awards voting body and Visit Philadelphia’s Hispanic Voices campaign. In 2025, she was honored as Freelance Journalist of the Year by Philadelphia's oldest press club.
Cecilia Romo
As a first-generation queer Latina, Cecilia Romo is a passionate filmmaker dedicated to creating diverse and inclusive spaces in film. Through her storytelling, she explores the beauty and complexity of marginalized voices, with a particular focus on the intersections of Latinx and queer identities. Cecilia’s award-winning debut short film, Sueños De Mi Hija, is a deeply personal story that examines the nuanced dynamics of Mexican immigrant mother-daughter relationships. The film has garnered significant recognition, including features in LatinaMediaCo, the 2023 STARZ "Take the Lead" Grant, and a Grand Jury Award at the March On Washington Film Festival in the Emerging Filmmaker category. Cecilia received the Sacramento Region Community Foundation BENT LGBTQ+ Grant and the Sacramento Film + Media Grant for her sophomore short film Me Porto Bonita, which explores the chaotic and transformative experiences of Queer Latinas navigating heartbreak and self-discovery in their 20s. Her latest project, Gloria, was recognized as a Semi-Finalist in the Sound & Scene: NewFest + Concord QTBIPOC Short Film Initiative, further solidifying her place as a rising voice in film. Her mission is to dismantle negative stereotypes of Latinas and LGBTQ+ individuals in film while creating authentic, culturally rich narratives through a Latina and queer-focused lens.
Alexis C. Garcia
Los Angeles-based filmmaker Alexis C. Garcia is an Afro-Puerto Rican writer, director, and producer. She wrote and directed the Oscar-qualified short DAUGHTER OF THE SEA as part of the Latino Film Institute’s Inclusion Fellowship sponsored by Netflix. Her work spans film, television, and digital media, including roles as a staff writer on a Disney+ animated series, a Story Producer on MTV’s DE LA CALLE, and a showrunner at BuzzFeed’s PERO LIKE. In 2022, she co-founded Botánica Pictures with her cousin and creative collaborator, Selina Morales. Together they have received development grants for narrative and documentary film work from the Library of Congress and the Independence Public Media Foundation.
María José Maldonado
María José Maldonado is a Salvadorian-Ecuadorian director and writer from Queens, NY. Her work affirms transness as a vital part of family legacy. Her upcoming docushort AIDS COULDN’T TAKE OUR MEMORIES OF YOU (post-production) is funded by the New York State Council on the Arts (NYSCA).
Her docushort MY FIERCE AUNT BIANCA (2023) has screened at Inside Out, New York Latino Film Festival, Philadelphia Latino Arts & Film Festival, San Francisco Transgender Film Festival, and others. It has exhibited at the Leslie-Lohman Museum of Art and Museum of Contemporary African Diasporan Arts at Governor's Island and will exhibit in Glasgow, Scotland this summer 2025.
Currently, María José is participating in Third World Newsreel’s Production Workshop 2025. She also participated in BRIC's Documentary Intensive Film Lab and Toronto Queer Film Festival Film Lab. She was a Visual AIDS Research Fellow (2023) and presented on her aunt Bianca's life and artistry at the Visual AIDS Symposium 2024 at the MoMA.
She was a Lambda Literary Speculative Fiction Fellow (2022), Sandra Cisneros’s Macondo Writers Workshop Fiction Fellow (2021), Leslie-Lohman Museum Artist Fellow (2020), Barbara Deming Fund feminist fiction grantee (2020) and Queer|Art Mentorship Literature Fellow (2019) mentored by Charles Rice-González.
They hold a JD/MBA from Howard University and BA in English and Women’s & Gender Studies from Dartmouth College. She’s a full-time mami-artist with a beautiful one-year-old.
Eric César Morales
I am a storyteller, activist, academic, and interdisciplinary artist (dance and crafts). I received my BA in English and Comparative Literature from San José State University, and MA and Ph.D. are from the Department of Folklore and Ethnomusicology at Indiana University. My master’s thesis focuses on the representation of Latinos in the media and my doctoral dissertation explores issues of cultural appropriation and globalization of indigenous artistic forms. For me, art is about developing a skill set and using it to help people arrive at their own unique insights about the human condition. At its core, good art encourages us to cogitate on a topic, look inwards, and, in the process, be prompted to better understand ourselves. Thus, by nature, I see art as collaborative, being borne from a dialogic, the interplay between the creator(s) and the audience. Art then becomes MORE powerful when there are numerous people involved, all contributing their ideas, worldviews, and talents.
Héctor Tapia
With a deep passion for both moving and still images, my journey as a cinematographer has taken me to breathtaking locations around the world, from Patagonia to San Francisco, Mexico City, New York, Los Angeles, Buenos Aires, Rio, and beyond. My work spans documentaries, landscapes, commercials, time-lapses, and aerial drone footage, each adventure enriching my artistic vision and personal growth. Storytelling through my lens has granted me freedom, knowledge, and a profound sense of connection to the world. I am honored to have been recognized with several awards, including the ASC Vision Mentorship Program 2022, Music Bed People’s Choice Award for “The Light Hunter,” and Best Cinematography at the Indie Short Fest LA International Film Festival. Additionally, my work on the acclaimed documentary “Bad Things Happen in Philadelphia” earned the Pinkenson Award for Best Local Feature and the Local Audience Award.
Stay tuned to learn more about what each artist’s project will feature during the upcoming cycle. We can’t wait for you to hear more about the exciting work of our 2025 Los Fellows.
