Denise Nikolakou

Denise Nikolakou is a Mental Health Counselor specializing in Synthetic Psychotherapy and Art Therapy. She holds an MSc on Movie-Based and Cinema Therapy and she obtained her European certification as a Cinema Therapist from the Existential-Humanistic Institute of San Francisco. Since 2016, she has been coordinating self-awareness and personal development groups and therapy, in role plays, training in functional relationship skills, on an individual and group level, using the art of cinema as a means of expression, psychoeducation and therapy. It is a member of the European Union

Federation of Psychologists' Associations (EFPA).

Since 2020 she is the head programmer of the Cinematherapy program of the Drama International Short Film Festival (DISFF).

The first Cinematherapy session in DISFF took place in a presentation-discussion with Oscar winning director Pawel Pawlikowski.

In the school period 2021-2022 she introduced the Cinematherapy program in public schools for the first time as an academic supervisor for the coordination and presentation in an initiative of DISFF Festival under the auspices of the Ministry of Culture.