Nicolas Steiner was born in 1984 in Switzerland and grew up in a small village in Valais, the southern mountain region of the country. During high school he worked as a gravedigger, played drums in several bands and completed his military service as an army percussionist. In 2005 and 2006 he attended the European Film College in Denmark, then studied ethnology and film studies for a year at the University of Zurich. Beginning in 2007 he trained in directing at the Film Academy Baden Württemberg in Ludwigsburg.
His short film It’s me. Helmut was shown at more than two hundred and forty festivals across all five continents and received forty two prizes and mentions, including a nomination for the 2010 German Short Film Prize. In 2010 he was awarded a Fulbright scholarship to the San Francisco Art Institute, where he focused on analogue photography and the development of board games. In 2014 he spent a year in Brooklyn as the Valais Canton Artist in Residence. Above and Below is his Film Academy graduation film and his feature length directorial debut.
