David Palazón, born in Barcelona in 1972, is a designer, visual artist and documentary filmmaker whose work spans design, photography, visual anthropology and cultural research. He studied art and design in Barcelona before continuing his education at the London College of Communication, the Royal College of Art and the EICTV in Cuba. Over the course of his career, he has travelled to more than 50 countries and lived and worked in the United Kingdom, Ghana, Peru, Timor Leste, Sri Lanka, Palestine, Bangladesh, Denmark and Pakistan, developing a diverse international practice.
Committed to the transformative role of culture and the arts, Palazón works at the intersection of artistic production, social justice and community engagement. He has collaborated with cultural and non profit organisations, including several United Nations agencies. In 2019, he was appointed Curator of the Rohingya Cultural Memory Centre by IOM, the UN Migration agency, in Bangladesh, where he led the project from its inception. This experience inspired Rohingyatographer, an award winning Rohingya refugee led initiative in the world’s largest refugee camp, which received the Casa Asia Award in 2024 in the category of Diversity, Inclusion and Sustainable Development.
During eight years in Timor Leste, he developed projects such as Chega! for the Commission for Reception, Truth and Reconciliation, and Uma Lulik, the first Timorese indigenous documentary. His photobook Timor Runguranga forms part of the Martin Parr collection at Tate in London. His documentary Wawata Topu received the Chandrika Sharma Special Prize at the International Film Festival Pêcheurs du Monde in Lorient in 2013. He has also received grants and awards including DOCTV CPLP, CLIP CETL, UnLtd and the Millenium Award from the Peabody Trust.
