Covered in Time and History: The Films of Ana Mendieta

This is the first and largest full-scale museum exhibition in the United States devoted to Ana Mendieta’s filmworks. One of the most influential Cuban-American artists of the post-World War II era, Mendieta’s (1948-1985) synthesis of sculpture, earth art and performance unflinchingly investigated what it means to be human.

The exhibition includes 21 films and 26 related photographs [...]. It underscores NSU Art Museum Fort Lauderdale’s emphasis on experimental postwar art and contemporary Cuban art.

Ana Mendieta is widely regarded as among the most original and talented artists of the post-war era. During her brief career, from 1971 to 1985, Mendieta produced a stunning body of work that included drawings, installations, performance, photographs, and sculptures. Less well known is her remarkable and prolific production of films and videos. Covered in Time and History: The Films of Ana Mendieta locates Mendieta’s moving image works at the center of her artistic oeuvre and with new research documents her prolific and varied use of the filmic medium, making clear her place as one of the key figures in the multidisciplinary visual arts practice that included filmworks and characterized the historic shifts in 1970s art.

“NSU Art Museum is honored to present this exhibition that complements the Museum’s strong concentration of Cuban contemporary artists. Mendieta is one of the most important and influential early performance artists and this exhibition brings new insight into a previously under represented aspect of her work in film”, said Bonnie Clearwater, Director and Chief Curator at NSU Art Museum Fort Lauderdale.

Credit: Exhibition overview from museum website


Whether or not you go, the richly illustrated catalog, Covered in Time and History: The Films of Ana Mendieta, presents a series of sequential color stills from each of twenty-one of Mendieta's original Super 8 films that have been newly preserved and digitized in high definition for the exhibition. These are combined with related photographs, and reference still images from all of the artist’s 104 filmworks. Together these illustrations sample the full range of the artist’s film practice from 1971 to 1981.