Totem

For decades Mexico has been considered as one of the most violent places in the world. Images of mutilated bodies and human heads found in plain sight have been circulating all over the national and international media. During the last 15 years, a very different violence, based on the erasure of the violent act rather than on its sensationalism, began to manifest itself: forced disappearance. Following this shift, Tótem is an experimental documentary that delves into the nature of contemporary disappearances in Mexico and the collectives of relatives that have emerged against this specific type of violence. It is formally structured in four chapters, each one holding a distinct sequence of images that allegorically approach the unrepresentable condition of disappearance itself. The story of a couple of archaeologists searching in vain for an ancient Olmec colossal head in a murky river appears at recurring intervals, questioning the very act of documenting absence and the invisible.