Funari

So I just finished a "master class" with filmmaker Vicky Funari. She is the award-winning director of MAQUILAPOLIS, LIVE NUDE GIRLS UNITE!, and PAULINA--all documentaries. She showed clips from these three films which focused on Mexican and Peep show girl populations. Funari defines herself as a feminist and her work as feminist.


The most interesting film in her selection of clips was an experimental project of hers from 1994, SKINESTHESIA. Her own opinion of the work was quite low. She sees it as dated, but still bringing up issues that she had hoped would have changed in our cultural experience in the last fourteen years. SKINESTHESIA follows Hanna, a performance artist and peep show dancer. It is an eighteen minute film about her and her body and the use of the body in her different environments. Funari employs split screen images to draw further comparisons between the imagery of the peep show and her professional performance. The use of language and poetry in voice over form reminds me of experimental and dance film coming from Sarah A.O. Rosner and her company, the AO Movement Collective. This artist also has an interest in the scientific words of the body, sexuality, and poetry.