Andrés Useche is a Colombian American writer, film director, graphic artist, singer-songwriter and activist.

Early life

Andres Useche was born in Manizales, Colombia. He wrote and drew his first published

political cartoon A political cartoon, also known as an editorial cartoon, is a cartoon graphic with caricatures of public figures, expressing the artist's opinion. An artist who writes and draws such images is known as an editorial cartoonist. They typically co ...

, "Soy Libre", at age 11. In high school, he won the Colombian Ministry of Culture Individual Creation Prize in Graphic Arts with his

graphic novel A graphic novel is a self-contained, book-length form of sequential art. The term ''graphic novel'' is often applied broadly, including fiction, non-fiction, and Anthology, anthologized work, though this practice is highly contested by comics sc ...

''Vana Espuma'' ("Idle Mist"). Upon high school graduation Useche composed music and scored documentaries. After graduating as a visual designer with emphasis on Film from the Universidad de Caldas, Useche moved to

Los Angeles, California Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

to work as a filmmaker, eventually gaining dual citizenship.

Career

Useche wrote, directed, edited, scored and starred in a short film adaptation of his graphic novel ''Idle Mist'' on a minuscule $100 budget. The short won the Best Fiction Film, Best Screenplay, and Best Actress

César Award Cesar or César may refer to: Arts and entertainment * César (film), ''César'' (film), a 1936 French romantic drama * César (film), ''César'' (play), a play by Marcel Pagnolt Places * Cesar, Portugal * Cesar Department, Colombia * Cesar R ...

s, and was also nominated for Best Actor and Best Music. In 2008, in support of Sen. Barack Obama's presidential campaign, Useche volunteered, sang and spoke at rallies and wrote, performed and co-directed in the

viral video Viral videos are video, videos that become popular through viral phenomenon, a viral process of Internet sharing, primarily through video sharing websites such as YouTube as well as social media and email.Lu Jiang, Yajie Miao, Yi Yang, ZhenZhon ...

" Si Se Puede Cambiar", a

Spanish language Spanish () or Castilian () is a Romance languages, Romance language of the Indo-European languages, Indo-European language family that evolved from the Vulgar Latin spoken on the Iberian Peninsula of Europe. Today, it is a world language, gl ...

music video A music video is a video that integrates a song or an album with imagery that is produced for promotion (marketing), promotional or musical artistic purposes. Modern music videos are primarily made and used as a music marketing device intended to ...

also co-directed by Eric Byler and Warren Fu, which debuted on

YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...

on February 22, from the group United For Obama. On April 8, 2008, "Si Se Puede Cambiar" was chosen by YouTube to represent Obama in the first-ever "Trendsetter Tuesday". Andres continued pushing for immigration reform in the United States and wrote the song "Dream to Belong" in direct support of the

DREAM Act The Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors Act, known as the DREAM Act, is a United States legislative proposal that would grant temporary conditional residency, with the right to work, for illegal immigrants who entered the Unite ...

References

External links

Borges: Influence and References - Andrés Useche
by Manu El on www.themodernworld.com

on The

Miami Herald The ''Miami Herald'' is an American daily newspaper owned by McClatchy, The McClatchy Company and headquartered in Miami-Dade County, Florida. Founded in 1903, it is the fifth-largest newspaper in Florida, serving Miami-Dade, Broward County, Fl ...

* [https://web.archive.org/web/20111006024544/http://media.rcn.com.co/plantillas/audio.php?ubicacion=http%3A%2F%2Faudio.rcn.com.co%2Fmedia%2Frcn%2Faudios%2FAndresUseche081108.mp3 ''Protagonistas del Mundo: Andrés Useche ''] on RCN TV, RCN Radio/TV station
''Channel 9 News: Andrés Useche and other young Democrats on Vice-Presidential debate''
on

CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS (an abbreviation of its original name, Columbia Broadcasting System), is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainme ...

Television
''Frontline on PBS''
on

PBS The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcaster and non-commercial, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly funded nonprofit organization and the most prominent provider of educat ...

Television
''Andrés Useche hosts Wondercon Panel''
on Temple of Geek {{DEFAULTSORT:Useche, Andres 1977 births Colombian singer-songwriters Colombian male singer-songwriters Colombian male writers Living people Colombian film directors 21st-century Colombian male singers American rock songwriters Film directors from Los Angeles American anti-racism activists Activists for Hispanic and Latino American civil rights American civil rights activists Nonviolence advocates American male singer-songwriters American rock singers Colombian emigrants to the United States Colombian graphic designers American music video directors 21st-century American male singers 21st-century American singer-songwriters