Kaori Flores Yonekura

Filmmaker
Kaori Flores Yonekura, a filmmaker with extensive experience in the audiovisual and graphic arts fields in Venezuela, Japan, and Latin America. In addition to creating and producing films, she distributes films in the cultural and educational markets of the United States (Harvard, Princeton, Columbia, NYU, and 20 other relevant universities), while also providing production services for projects around the world (Brazil, Germany, Costa Rica, Switzerland, among others).Kaori studied at the International School of Film and Television of San Antonio de los Baños (EICTV).
She has received scholarships and residencies related to filmmaking and cultural promotion from various organizations such as the French Institute, O'Higgins University, Ibermedia, the Carolina Foundation, the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Bolivia Lab, and the National Autonomous Center for Cinematography. She earned a diploma in "Postwar Japan" from the University of Tokyo. She has over 30 credits in individual and collective audiovisual productions, and her works have been presented at more than twenty festivals and competitions around the world.
Kaori is the creator and director of the CINESCOPE Film Training Program, which awards over 400 scholarships to Latin American filmmakers and cultural managers with the support of the Ibermedia program. She also collaborates on script and project selection, as well as development consulting, at isLAb (Puerto Rico), Flicc (Mexico), PDVSA La Estacia (Venezuela), and in competitions and workshops at the French Embassy in Venezuela that involve Andean filmmakers. She has also collaborated with the University of the Arts of Ecuador with workshops at the "Interactos" event. She is a founding member of the Venezuelan Film Academy.
Films
Nikkei
The extraordinary journey of Dragon
Labels



Documentary. Feature film, 85 min. 2011.
Contries: Venezuela - Peru - Japan.
In Nikkei, director Kaori tells the story of her grandparents’ journey from Japan to Peru to Venezuela. Along the way, their personal search for a new home is set against the larger backdrop of the history of Japanese immigration.
Documentary. Feature film, 84 min. 2025.
Contries: Venezuela - Peru - Japan.
A filmmaker discovers a family treasure: the photographs of her great-uncle Yoshitomi, who documented her life from 1933 to 1945. From his youth as a soldier in Japan, his migration to Peru, to his time as a prisoner in Venezuela during World War II. Through these images, the figure of the Dragon emerges, a chimera that, like migrants, adapts and transforms according to the territories it conquers, fusing memory, myth and reality.
Documentary. Short film, 2 min. 2025.
Contries: Venezuela - Peru - Japan.
IIn 1942, a Japanese American girl wondered why her mother had placed a tag on her while they waited for the train to take them to an unknown location.
Store
Books
Tetsuo's Quartz
During the 1930s, when they left their parents' home, Emi and her brother Makoto each received half of a crystal that their father Tetsuo had obtained on Mount Kinpu.Makoto joins the army that travels to Manchuria and Emi gets on a boat to go marry a stranger in Peru and then moves to Venezuela. That crystal becomes his connection to his home and family amid his experiences in unknown lands of Asia and America before, during and after World War II.
25 pags.
English/Spanish
Physical and Digital Book
Perfect your Pitch
The art of effectively presenting a cinematic idea, known as "film pitch", plays a crucial role in the film industry. In this process, creators are challenged to distill the essence of their project into a concise and compelling presentation. The importance of this skill cannot be underestimated, as a strong tone can make the difference between a project being enthusiastically accepted and being forgotten in the crowd of ideas.
43 pags.
English/Spanish
Physical and Digital Book