La cabeza mató a todos

2014 - Film & Video (Film & Video)

Beatriz Santiago Muñoz

year born: 1972
nationality: Puerto Rican
home town: San Juan, Puerto Rico

La cabeza mató a todos or “The Head that Killed Everyone”, is a mixing of indigenous mythologies with present-day characters, geographies, and culture in Puerto Rico. The title refers to how a shooting star was (in local mythology) interpreted as a head without a body, crossing the sky, signaling the arrival of chaos and destruction. The actor in the video, Michelle Nonó, is in touch with native plants—she’s a medicinal botanist but also a cultural activist. She hosts cultural events in her house, in a primarily Afro-Caribbean and post-industrial area called Carolina. Cats are very common on the island of Puerto Rico, and in this video, the cat is cast as a mythological entity, capable of world-altering transformations. The soundtrack further blends time and space as it alternates between a track from the Peruvian punk band, Los Psychos, and the chirping and croaking music of the coquí frog that populate Puerto Rico’s wet landscapes. These elements combine to imagine a spell that can destroy military industries, confronting the complexities of this system on a poetic plane rather than a rational one.


Beatriz Santiago Muñoz lives and works in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Her approach to making films and videos resembles the careful approach of an ethnographer. She learns about the place, the site of the film, its cultural histories and local mythologies. She learns about the people who are both subject and actors. She invites them to participating through enacting their own life, or an aspect of their cultural history. They trace the contours of cultural memory, and frame political and social issues. Her work combines documentary record, indigenous historical memory, participatory inflections, chance discovery, and fictional explorations.


Colors:



Related works sharing similar palette

Matthew Buckingham
© » KADIST

New York, August 2011, Gloria Maso met Matthew Buckingham who told her about his work “The six grandfathers, Paha Sapa, in the year 502 002” (2002)...

Angela Su’s True Calling
© » KADIST

Angela Su

2019

Produced in an interview format and as an extended chapter of Cosmic Call (2019) in the KADIST Collection, Angela Su’s True Calling by Angela Su documents the artist’s answers to a series of questions on the conception of her 2019 film that proposes speculative cosmic synchronicities for an alternative understanding of epidemics that is not built on the foundation and authority of Western medical science...

The Possibility of the Half
© » KADIST

Minouk Lim

2012

The Possibility of the Half by Minouk Lim is a two-channel video projection that begins with a mirror image of a weeping woman kneeling on the ground...

Opening : Anne Deguelle — L’Arctique fantôme
© » SLASH PARIS

Anne Deguelle — L’Arctique fantôme — L'ahah Moret — Exhibition — Slash Paris Login Newsletter Twitter Facebook Anne Deguelle — L’Arctique fantôme — L'ahah Moret — Exhibition — Slash Paris English Français Home Events Artists Venues Magazine Videos Back Anne Deguelle — L’Arctique fantôme Exhibition Photography Upcoming Anne Deguelle, Glacier, 2014, 40 × 53 cm © Adagp, Paris, 2023 Anne Deguelle L’Arctique fantôme In about 2 months: January 27 → February 17, 2024 vernissage le 27.01.24, 17h → 21h exposition du 27.01 → 17.02.2024 L’ahah #Moret 24-26, rue Moret, 75011 Paris L’ahah est heureuse de présenter cet hiver en L’ahah #Moret une série singulière de photographies dans l’œuvre de l’artiste Anne Deguelle ...

Dans la vallée
© » SOCIETY

Cet article est à lire dans Society #223, disponible en kiosque du 01 au 14 fÉvrier....

In View
© » KADIST

Randa Maddah

2017

Shot from the rooftop of her house in Majdal Shams, through a complex construction of moving mirrors, this video connects both sides of the border which has cut through Syrian Golan heights since the 1967 Six-Day war...

Until It Makes Sense
© » KADIST

Mario Garcia Torres

2004

Mario Garcia Torres imagines cinematic devices to replay stories occasionally forgotten by Conceptual art...

Mr Joe Shrigley Jr, président de la nation Navajo
© » KADIST

Bruno Serralongue

2008

The half-length portrait of Joe Shirley presents a man with a great presence, wearing several items that point to ancestral Native American culture...

An Overblown Anselm Kiefer Documentary by Wim Wenders Retells the Same Boring Myths
© » ARTNEWS REVIEWS

Review: ‘Anselm,’ by Wim Wenders, Is a Boring Anselm Kiefer Film – ARTnews.com Skip to main content By Alex Greenberger Plus Icon Alex Greenberger Senior Editor, ARTnews View All December 8, 2023 9:15am Still from Anselm , 2023...

A4 x KADIST Video Library Project
© » KADIST

Luxelakes • A4 Art Museum and KADIST are pleased to announce the launch of a partnership that aims to facilitate access to video works by international contemporary artists for research, education, and enjoyment...

American Express explores the meaning of play through four artist collaborations
© » WALLPAPER*

American Express explores the meaning of play | Wallpaper The Miami installation debuting Play by American Express Platinum during Miami Art Week 2023 (Image credit: Courtesy American Express) By Tilly Macalister-Smith published 12 December 2023 In celebration of Design Miami and Art Basel Miami , American Express has commissioned four young artists and designers - Eny Lee Parker, Surin Kim, Serban Ionescu, and Kumkum Fernando - to reinterpret childhood toys into iconic limited edition collectibles...

Untitled (Jesse)
© » KADIST

Gregory Halpern

2016

Gregory Halpern spent five years shooting ZZYZX , and another year editing the results, from an estimated thousand rolls of film, about half of which were shot in the final year after his Guggenheim Fellowship enabled him to live in California...

Philanthropist Ella Fontanals-Cisneros on Thinking of ‘the Americas’ as One When It Comes to Collecting - via artnet
© » LARRY'S LIST

The founder of Miami's CIFO foundation takes a wide-ranging view of contemporary art, informed by her own experiences as a global citizen....

Once-thriving Myanmar cinema readies for new wave (via Nikkei Asian Review)
© » ARTS EQUATOR

Once-thriving Myanmar cinema readies for new wave (via Nikkei Asian Review) | ArtsEquator Thinking and Talking about Arts and Culture in Southeast Asia ArtsEquator Radar July 2, 2018 YANGON — Change is afoot in Myanmar’s now moribund movie industry...

Sirens
© » KADIST

Paul Kos

1977

Taking its title from the eponymous mythological creature—famously featured as sea nymphs in Homer’s Odyssey...

Der Wanderer 3
© » KADIST

Elina Brotherus

A subject’s back stands before a landscape of mountains, arid and majestic, Der Wanderer 3 revisits the theme of man versus nature dear to Romantic painting and the paintings of Caspar David Friedrich in particular...

Street Artist Captures the Spirit of Travel in Stunning Mural of a Backpack-Clad Girl
© » MODERN MET ART

Hera Transforms Stavanger's Train Platform Into a Work of Art Home / Art / Street Art Street Artist Captures the Spirit of Travel in Stunning Mural of a Backpack-Clad Girl By Jessica Stewart on December 16, 2023 German street artist Hera has just transformed a train platform in Stavanger, Norway, into a work of art...

Job opportunity: Collection Fellowship, Asia
© » KADIST

KADIST is seeking a Collection Fellow based in the Asia Pacific for November 2023 (6-month position with 8-10 hours per week commitment) KADIST offers a paid six-month collection fellowship to an emerging curator or recent graduate of art history, museum studies, critical writing, or a related field from college or university programs...

Final works and a Pokemon mashup: New van Gogh exhibitions
© » FRANCE24

Final works and a Pokemon mashup: New van Gogh exhibitions - arts24 Skip to main content Final works and a Pokemon mashup: New van Gogh exhibitions Issued on: 06/10/2023 - 16:58 11:53 arts24 © FRANCE 24 screengrab By: Marion CHAVAL | Aline BOTTIN | Magali FAURE | Alison SARGENT In this roundup of cultural news, we kick off with the winner of this year's Nobel Prize in Literature: Norwegian author and playwright Jon Fosse...