Cineast member of the Académie de France in Madrid in 2012-13, Vanessa Rousselot directed the documentary ‘Blague à part’, which is about a quest for Palestinian humour through Cisjordan, and won several awards. She also directed the web-documentary ‘Drawing the Revolution’ about some of the greatest arab cartoonists, for The Guardian, and ‘Pionnières’ for France 24. She studied History of the contemporary arab world at La Sorbonne and classical arab the university of Oriental Languages (INALCO), before studying documentary-directing at the Ateliers Varan in Paris.