Filling (Feeling) the Archival Void

Abstract

The video essay “Filling (Feeling) the Archival Void” delves into the systematic erasure and archival dispossession of works by early women filmmakers, using the case study of Helena Cortesina and her lost film Flor de España (1922), which was falsely attributed to a male director. Through a counterhegemonic, provocative, “accented” approach, the video essay challenges established, patriarchal film histories and exposes the lies hidden within their seemingly rigorous discourse. First, it pays homage to the authorship of an almost forgotten filmmaker, Helena Cortesina, while also making her lost film visible, ensuring that at least some of its images are brought to light. Second, it explores the potential of the video essay as a feminist archive—a practice-based counterarchive, capable of producing counterhegemonic discourses that subvert the status quo. Third, by challenging the presumed “objectivity” of traditional film scholarship through openly poetic, subjective, and imaginative modes of expression, it establishes and validates a new epistemology.