Narcisa Hirsch

Narcisa Hirsch (née Heuser, 16 February 1928 – 4 May 2024) was an Argentine experimental filmmaker of German birth.

She cited Salvador Dalí and Luis Buñuel as influences on her experimental film work, as well as the Bauhaus artists of Germany.

[2] Latterly, her work was honored through several retrospectives at international film festivals, though it was relatively unknown outside of exclusive circles when it first premiered.

At 9 she and her mother visited Argentina, which turned into a much longer stay than intended when World War II broke out.

Consisting of a giant female skeleton covered in fruit and stuffed with live pigeons,[8] Hirsch became interested in the idea of filmmaking when she sought out filmmaker Raymundo Gleyzer to record the act of passerbys removing the fruit, metaphorically and physically devouring the female body, specifically a pineapple which she placed at the sex of the skeleton.

[3] After becoming interested in film, Hirsch traveled to New York and began to explore New American Cinema, and attending classes at the MOMA.

They rarely screened their works in traditional venues, with the exception of the Goethe Institute, which allowed them the creative freedom they desired.

In that same year, she met her mentor Werner Nekes while studying at the Goethe Institutes of Buenos Aires.

Throughout the film's 11-minute run time, Hirsch continuously narrates, revealing deeper truths and personal stories behind the objects depicted on the screen.

[7] Hirsch has an extended body of work beyond these pieces, including Diarios Patagónicos (1972–73), Taller (1975), Testamento y Vida Interior (1977), Homecoming (1978), Ama-zona (1983), A-Dios (1989), Rumi (1999), Aleph (2005), and El Mito de Narciso (2011).

[11] Her work is also part of the traveling exhibit started at The Hammer called "Radical Women: Latin American Art 1960 - 1985".