At just 26 years old, director Cuba Tornado Scott has already evolved a unique and boundary-defying sensibility that has her seeking out projects across platforms and genres. A multi-hyphenate artist in the truest sense, Cuba’s wide-ranging passions continue to inform her work (let’s just say that she’s done everything from cooking under renowned Argentine chef Francis Mallmann to competing as a high level equestrian show jumper!)

Already an accomplished illustrator and equestrian, Cuba began working in fashion at age 16, modeling for photographers Mario Testino, Michel Comte, Patrick Demarchelier, Fabien Baron, and Bruce Weber. For her own visual art project “Under the Influence of Bacon,” she used makeup, lighting and set design to transform herself into Francis Bacon paintings. The resulting images (shot by Malik Hassan Sayeed) were accompanied by Cuba’s illustrations, and were featured in the poster book Chaos SixtyNine.

Cuba’s art-driven sensibility carried over into her work as a director, first evidenced in her whimsical short film “9 1/2” for Fairmont Hotels which premiered at TIFF in 2018. She went on to direct and shoot behind the scenes documentary films for Gladiator, The Last Duel and House of Gucci (for which she also shot the on-set stills and poster images). She has also assisted director Luca Guadagnino and Malik Hassan Sayeed as both a 2nd unit director of photography and stills photographer. Her latest endeavor involves a short film about the best iron worker in the world, also to be shot by Malik in New Mexico.