SYNOPSIS

The outcome of Hernández’ friendship with the dancer and choreographer Bernardo Montet, this work, ranging from black-and-white to color, is the vertiginous record of a cross-dressing act, or a therapeutic performance on identity. Presented for the first time in Rouen, on May 26th 1987.

BIOGRAPHY

Teo Hernández was a Mexican experimental filmmaker who filmed mainly in a Super 8 format. In 1958, he created, together with Antonio Campomanes, the Center for Cinematographic Experimentation (CEC) in Mexico. From 1966 onwards, he lived and worked in Paris, where he created MétroBarbèsRochechou Art (1980), an experimental film collective, along with Gabriel Badaud aka Gaël, Michel Nédjar and Jacques Haubois aka Jakobois. In his exploration of the relation between image, movement and body, he maintained a close collaboration with Studio dm (1983), a dance company founded in Paris by Bernardo Montet and Catherine Diverrès, who shaped a choreographic praxis strongly tied to literature and butoh. In France, his works have been linked to Cinéma Corporal or The School of the Body, an artistic research movement surrounding gender and body identity. After his death, his work was bequeathed to Michel Nédjar who has kept it safeguarded at the Musée National d’Art Moderne at the Pompidou Center in Paris ever since.

Editing: Teo Hernández
With Bernardo Montet
Super 8 Film, color and B&W, w/sound
Donated by M. Michel Nédjar in 2000
Inventory Number: AM 2000-F92
Collection: Centre Pompidou, Paris. Musée National d’Art Moderne/Centre de création Industrielle