Paula Astorga Riestra is a filmmaker who graduated from the Centro de Capacitación Cinematográfica, and founded Circo 2.12 in 2000, an initiative dedicated to promoting and developing audiovisual culture in Latin America. She directed Mexico's Cineteca Nacional from 2010 to 2013, leading its architectural transformation; for this work she was awarded the title of Chevalier of the Order of Arts and Letters by the French government in 2012 and was nominated for the Mont Blanc Foundation's 2014 Patronage of the Arts Award. Between 2022 and 2024, she served as Head of Studies/Producer's Lab for the Locarno Film Festival's Open Doors program, focused on Latin America and the Caribbean, and in 2024 she was artistic director of the Doclisboa International Film Festival in Portugal. As a producer, she has worked on films including María Novaro's Las buenas hierbas and Tesoros, Jaime Cohen Ades's Omar y Gloria, and Anabel Caso's Trigal, and served as executive producer of The Dead Don't Hurt, directed by Viggo Mortensen, while also heading production management at Talipot Studio (2021-2023); she is currently producing Nina Wara Carrasco's upcoming documentary Me niego rotundamente. Based in San Miguel de Allende, Guanajuato, she is currently a professor at Universidad CENTRO, a consultant, executive director of FICUNAM's Seminar on Publics and Audiences of the Future, and in March 2026 opened Librería Inventario, a new cultural space in the city.