Mänk’áčen

Mänk’áčen – Mänk’áčen (“the shadow hunter” in the Yahgan language) thus presents the findings of artist/researcher and curator Sergio Valenzuela Escobedo, and also relies on an ethnographic archive to defend the thesis of the existence of a “mystical mechanics”; text by Justo Pastor Mellado. It means “to look at the head covered with a veil”.
This is how the Fuegians named the act of photography in the nineteenth century, when they saw the first cameras with operators who landed in South America from 1840. What names did the local people give to these new image-objects ? How was this unknown tool perceived ? What does it mean to be looked at with a veil on your head ?

Mänk’áčen (“the shadow hunter” in the Yahgan language) thus presents the findings of artist/researcher and curator Sergio Valenzuela Escobedo, and also relies on an ethnographic archive to defend the thesis of the existence of a “mystical mechanics”; text by Justo Pastor Mellado.