Selected Film Works, 1972-1981 Ana Mendieta made over 70 films, which document her performances, made in galleries, and her sculptural works in nature. Starting with her first ephemeral works, she was careful to maintain a record, and thus systematically used photography or film to capture them. The films from this selection were produced between November 1972 and June 1981. They present the chronology of her works and allow us to understand the evolution of her work and the permanence of her subjects. Often made in Super 8, the length of shooting was thus conditioned by the size of the reel, which lasts 3 minutes maximum. The work Untitled (Chicken Piece) is probably one of her most famous performances. It was shot in 1972, and shows recurrent elements of her work, like the nudity of the female body, blood and feathers. In a sacrificial ritual, a chicken, decapitated in front of an audience, makes its last jolts, hanging from Mendieta’s hands, who is standing naked in front of the white wall of the gallery, letting herself be splattered by the sprays of blood that run from the chicken’s neck. The performance refers explicitly to religious sacrifice, particularly that of the Santeria cult, which is very popular in Cuba. It ritualises a two-fold sacrifice: that of the poultry and that of the artist’s body, surrendered to the public. In Body Tracks, Mendieta, standing with her back to the audience, presses her raised arms against the white wall and traces two lines down to the floor with blood, soaked into the sleeves of her shirt, creating the form of a tree with her body. In a reversal of the Siluetas, in which she inscribes her body within the organic elements of nature, here, it is her body that imprints nature within the bounds of the civilised world. She began her Siluetas series in 1974, with the sequence Laberinth Silueta, shot in Mexico at a historic site. The two-dimensional form of the artist’s body is traced with blood on the ground, contrasting with the grey pillars of old stones, weathered by time. Uprooted in her youth, Mendieta’s relationship with the land was fundamentally important to her. By leaving her imprint on the ground, she is taking possession of the site, and recovering a connection with nature. In Untitled (Grass Breathing), a sequence shot lasting 3 minutes shows a grass field, in which a piece of land is raised, as though through the effects of respiration. The breathing accelerates then slows, allowing a rectangular cut the size of Mendieta’s body to appear – it is her body that ‘gives life’ to this earth. Burial of the Nanigo records a gallery installation. In the darkened space of the gallery, a Silueta burns out, lying flat in a position of sacrifice with its outline traced with candles. Filmed at the opening, the black marks on the ground were the only elements visible for the duration of the exhibition. For Candle Ixchell, Black Ixchell, the notion of ritual is even more striking. A body is lying down and rolled up in felt in a rectangle drawn on the floor, with ceremonial objects placed on it: a hand, a mirror and a candle. Next, a major series of Siluetas is documented, with just the name of the place and a characteristic serving as introductions: Silueta in stones and gunpowder in a desert, in stone and earth, in moss in a swamp, in sand by the sea, and so on. The final sequence, shot in Iowa, shows a figure painted on the cracks of very arid earth. Gunpowder has been slipped into the cracks, and burns down, retracing the outline and smoking up the space, resulting in a very mysterious atmosphere… then a final explosion!

Patricia Maincent