Andrés Janacua – 16mm Film as a Medium of Texture and Memory
There’s too much liquidity in digital formats… 16mm’s limits force contending with what you’ve captured, for better or worse.
Andrés Janacua delves into the textures of 16mm film, the philosophical nature of moving images, empathy through animals the collaborative spirit that defines his unique approach to contemporary art.
Andrés Janacua is a voice of profound introspection and subtle provocation in contemporary art, merging heritage with a unique, tactile approach to moving images. Known for his mastery of 16mm film, Janacua’s work exudes a layered depth, exploring memory, perception the elusive nature of visual narratives. His pieces engage the viewer with a haze of grain and warmth, fostering a space where images aren’t just seen but felt—hovering between familiarity and ambiguity. His work serves as an invitation to question the nature of knowledge, to embrace the unpredictability of perception to find meaning in the unresolved.
This exclusive interview offers readers a glimpse into Janacua’s creative world. We discuss his inspirations, from the allure of analog film’s physicality to the complexity of working with found images and animal representations. Janacua’s reflections on collaboration through Galería Perdida, his evolving artistic philosophy the impact of his varied residency experiences reveal the rich textures and contradictions that animate his practice. As a teacher and artist, Janacua is a true innovator, transforming his multifaceted background into a captivating, boundary-defying art form.
What inspired you to focus on 16mm film and the exploration of moving images in your artistic practice?
I understood that the use of 16mm as a means to create distance, that is, there’s enough grain, flare gossamer of colour to push the images back further from the viewer. Oftentimes, this haziness, this atmospheric perspective, lets the images float and linger in the presence of the viewer. I took to the medium for its tactility, warmth familiarity.
I appreciate how moving images are testimonial in nature and I aim to suggest that the presumption of knowledge is to be questioned, or second guessed. It’s an epistemological bent that points to gullibility, the nature of taxonomies the slipperiness of images. I am keen to have the moving images result in far more questions than a crisp narrative arc. The frames of film are paths to unravel what things we know and what things we presumed to know.
Can you describe your approach to combining original footage with appropriated materials from the 16mm archive and lantern slide collection?
The majority of the time I shoot original footage that may be culled from images I’ve seen or collected. Scenes that we reworked and reimagined for the context of the film. From time to time I will combine footage with found footage for its elasticity. I appreciate the tonal quality of this footage and in particular the found images from various sources, including a lantern slide collection courtesy the Visual Studies Workshop in Rochester, NY where I spent a brief moment as an artist in residence. Certain images are prosaic to counter the rest of the images as some can be spectacular. All of these images have an inherent currency. It is this agency that draws me to images that I had no hand in crafting.
Why are you particularly interested in the representation of quadrupeds in your work what do you hope to convey through this focus?
(great question) The desire to use animals, quadrupeds in particular, holds packages of empathy that can be a connective tissue for any given viewer. These creatures, burdensome as they are charming, reflect perhaps the specificity of memory or referent. They are conduits for expressive means of concerns pointing often to bits of humor, frailty, stubbornness, malaise confusion—all naturally human tendencies.
In all honesty, my direct relationship to animals has been at an arm’s distance. Growing up in rural Mexico and Los Angeles, these beings were functional things, not repositories of love and care. In this manner they’ve manifested differently in my response and approach to them. In a way, they too have been anomalous to me, figuring out a way to relate to something I’ve long neglected.
How has your experience at previous artist residencies, such as at MFAH CORE and Queens Museum, influenced your artistic development and current project?
My privilege of having attended several residencies has afforded me not only the resources of such programs but the fundamental benefit of the time allowed to focus on questions driving my practice at the time. Most interestingly perhaps is the allowance of being transposed into different geographies, histories demographics. Feeling out of water has its silver lining.
In what ways do you believe that the medium of 16mm film allows for a unique expression of narrative compared to digital formats?
You’re forced to deal with the tactile qualities of 16mm—its format forces a recognition of linearity that will either be embraced or reconstituted. Regardless, time is conditional and images are made further concrete. There’s too much liquidity in digital formats. I value them for what they are but the advantage of 16mm are its limits and contending with what you’ve captured in its footage, for better or worse.
As the founder of Galería Perdida, how has your involvement in collective spaces shaped your perspective on collaboration and community in the arts?
Galería Perdida recognized collectivity as a persuasive argument against the character of the singular artist and the character of the exhibiting institution. Collaboration was necessary for its success but not inherently the only manner of production. That is, the name was driving force to foment context around a work of art. How does a gallery become responsible for the production of the artwork and not only its exhibition? It’s a conflict of interest surely, but a confounding and confusing enterprise. One that suggests that collaboration is best steered under a homogenized identity and community a novelty of better times.
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