Raphael Montañez Ortíz
- Directing
- January 30, 1934 · Brooklyn, New York, USA
Biography
Raphael Montañez Ortíz (b. 1934, New York) is a multidisciplinary artist perhaps best known for his radical performances of the 1960s as part of the Destructivist movement which he helped to articulate. Not many know that he is also a pioneer of found footage cinema who deserves greater recognition within the American filmic avant-garde. Starting in 1957, he produced a number of singular works by subjecting 16mm prints of commercially- or institutionally-produced films to a cut-up method inspired by Yaqui shamanic practices, a kind of ritualistic chance operation intended to break down their structure and thoroughly undermine their discursive power. In the mid-1980s, Montañez Ortiz continued his critical deconstructions of commercial cinema, this time exploring a novel format: the laser disc. Having created a special interactive setup at the computer lab of Rutgers University, the artist transformed micro-moments from classic films into looping, stuttering choreographies that, through obsessive repetition, reveal the tacit gestualities and subconscious inner dynamics of these seemingly innocent Hollywood scenes.
Known for
Filmography
- Arthur Janov's Primal Therapy
- Couch Destruction: Angel Release · Director
- Piano Destruction Concert: Dada con Mama · Director
- Busy Bodies · Director
- It's Coming Up · Director
- The Conversation · Editing, Director
- Introspective: Ortiz Art-Work Late 1950s - Late 1980s · Director
- Ring Ring Rag Time · Director
- Piano Destruction Concert: Humpty Dumpty Had a Great Fall · Director
- That's Too Much · Director
- Dance Number 22 · Director, Editing
- Our Thoughts Are Made of Clay: The Horsewomyn of the Apocalypse · Editing, Director
- Gonna Get Me a Gal · Editing, Director
- Here's Looking At You Kid · Director
- If You Don't Want It Anymore · Director, Editing
- Man Has Man Has Always · Director, Editing
- Pushann Pushann · Director
- Good and Evil · Director, Editing
- I Spent My Last Breathe At Thee · Director, Editing
- You Bust Your Bunns · Editing, Director
- Couplett · Director, Editing
- Stop Stop Stop Stop · Director, Editing
- The First Born Female Child · Director, Editing
- Welcome · Director, Editing
- What Is This · Director, Editing
- The Kiss · Editing, Director
- Beach Umbrella · Director
- Dance Number · Director
- Henny Penny: The Sky Is Falling · Director, Editing
- Newsreel · Editing, Director
- Cowboy and "Indian" Film · Editing, Director
- Golf · Editing, Director
- Ritual Destruction of "Follow Through" · Director