Evidence

A slow, intimate performance piece that feels like a living memorial, blending body, sound, and memory into a quiet, haunting meditation.

Directed by

Abigail Severance, Julie Tolentino

Overview

In evidence, Julie Tolentino’s naked, moving body articulates backward on her hands and knees, balancing a cluster of Asian medicine cups. The piece, originally made in 2010 in collaboration with Abigail Severance, was remixed for Visual AIDS in 2014. Tolentino's self-made sound piece was added and initiates the video with a queer list of loved ones living and lost, recognizable or not, as both invocation and provocation of individuals who deeply shifted her perspective. As the listed names blur and are archived in Tolentino's body, evidence opens up to the list's potency through a female, brown, artist/activist body in the unseen yet held spaces of relationship, memory, sex and loss. Commissioned by Visual AIDS in 2014 as part of ALTERNATE ENDINGS, a program of seven videos that bring together charged moments and personal memories amidst the public history of HIV/AIDS.

How it feels

Melancholic, earnest, eerie and warm. Slow-burning and demanding.

About

Memory, grief, identity, sexuality

Content

Strong sexual content. Mild language. No violence or gore.

Note

Written by AI, so it can be wrong. Full breakdown

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