Rosalba Oxandabarat was born in Salto, Uruguay, in 1944.[1][2][3][4] On her mother's side, she was a descendant of the Uruguayan founding father José Gervasio Artigas.[4]
Oxandabarat studied in the Architecture Department of the University of the Republic, where she was a student activist.[2][4]
In 1970, she began writing for the weekly newspaper Marcha.[2][4][5] After being exiled to Peru in 1974 during the dictatorship, she contributed stories to the newspapers La Crónica (es), El Caballo Rojo, 30 Días, and El Búho.[1][4] Her writing included film and book reviews, interviews, and essays.[2]
In the mid-1980s, she returned to Uruguay to work at the newly launched weekly newspaper Brecha.[1][2][4] She eventually became the newspaper's culture editor and then its director, from 2008 to 2012, and she continued writing for Brecha until her retirement.[1] She frequently returned to Peru, where in 1995 she served as Brecha's correspondent covering the Cenepa War.[2]
Known for her work as a film critic, Oxandabarat was interested in cinema from a young age.[4] Along with fellow Architecture Department alumni, she collaborated on the 1969 documentary Refusila.[4][6][7] The following year, she became a founding member of the Cinemateca del Tercer Mundo (C3M) group, many of whom had joined her in exile in Peru.[1][2][6] She was also a member of the Film Critics Association of Uruguay (es).[1] Among her favorite directors were John Ford, Jean Vigo, and François Truffaut.[4]
Oxandabarat was married to Julián Legaspi, with whom she had two children, Julián and Soledad.[2][4][8] She died in Montevideo in 2023, at age 78.[1]
