Universitat Pompeu Fabra was founded in 1990 by the Catalan government with the aim of creating a public university focused on academic excellence and thus contributing to the development of the country. The university specializes in research and training in areas of knowledge related to the various dimensions of the human being, including biology, communication and social phenomena. The university model is based on a policy of openness to the world, and incorporates important national and international researchers.

UPF strategic plan and mission:

• to train, through a rigorous, innovative and personalized educational model, people with a solid scientific and cultural background, general skills that can be adapted to the changes and challenges of society and the specific skills they need to successfully carry out their projects of life;
• to become a leading research university;
• to promote innovation and social transformation;
• to go beyond the walls of the institution to generate synergies with society in order to contribute to social well-being and create value;
• to promote the commitment to culture;
• to become a ‘think tank’ – that is, a forum for discussion and reflection at the service of culture – that offers tools to decipher the contemporary world while actively working on it.

The research activity is structured around ten research groups: CAS, CINEMA, CRITICC, DIGIDOC, GRP, JOVIS, GRECC, MEDIUM, POLCOM, UNICA and includes participation in various research projects and agreements.

TESEO is part of the activities of the Aestethic Research of the Audiovisual Media Group (CINEMA), that was born in Pompeu Fabra University in 2003. The main objective of the CINEMA Group is to set up a venue for researchers from different sectors to analyze both the history of cinema and the contemporary events of the film event. So CINEMA first investigates the aesthetic, narratological and hermeneutic study of the audiovisual work, considering the image as a receptacle of philosophical, social and political contradictions, and proposing an investigation that makes cinema dialogue with other artistic manifestations such as painting, literature, theater and dance, without forgetting its close ties to television and video games. Comparative cinema as a methodological view is divided into different schemes, and is the conceptual core of the comparative magazine Cinema, edited by the group since 2012, or editorial initiatives. During its early years, the CINEMA group focused its attention on European cinema through two research programs: Aesthetic Audiovisual Trends in the European Context (CEACE, 2003-2006) and the Observatory of Contemporary European Cinema (OCEC, 2006-2012). As part of these programs, several international conferences have been held.