Alexis Gambis

Alexis Gambis is a French-Venezuelan biologist-turned filmmaker and a TED 2019 Fellow. His films combine documentary and fiction, oftentimes embracing animal perspectives. He has written and directed over a dozen shorts that have played at festivals worldwide. His first feature film The Fly Room which has screened in over 50 cities, is based on the true story of the birth of modern genetics and was produced with support from the Spike Lee Production Fund and Hollywood Foreign Press Association. He is in post-production on his second feature Son of Monarchs, which delves into issues of immigration, migration and animal-human hybrids. 

His work aims at transforming the way science is communicated to the public through film and visual arts.  He received his PhD in Molecular Biology at The Rockefeller University and a Masters in Fine Arts from NYU Tisch School of the Arts. His first feature film The Fly Room about the birthplace of genetics in New York has toured festivals and academic institutions worldwide ending with a theatrical release in New York, Paris, and Berlin in the fall of 2017. He has been featured in The New York Times, Forbes, Nature, Cell, TED, and WNYC. At New York University, he teaches in both the Biology and Film departments. His courses combine scientific research and storytelling often featuring animals as actors and blurring the lines between fact and fiction. He is also the founder and executive director of the Imagine Science Films, an annual science film festival now celebrating its 10th anniversary. He also recently launched LABOCINE, a science film platform, research video database and magazine coined by reviewers as the "science new wave."