When I read the book by María Sáenz Quesada, a long time ago, it seemed incredible to me how this woman had done all this and I knew so little. And that is where the question she asks the documentary appears: why do I know her only because she lent the house for the performance of the hymn? Did she sing it or did she not sing it? What is the importance of that? Is that why they remember her?” says Sabrina Farji. The woman he is talking about, that woman, is Mariquita Sanchez de Thompson, always canonized in the history books as the first to sing the hymn. Farji knows it, and she takes her variety of looking, and she applies the universe of video art and documentary to that woman. This is how Mariquita generates: Revolution Woman, a film that illuminates much more than the historical figure she feels close to. Farji takes up that first idea: “It always seemed to me that behind that there was a secret: what is the point? What don’t they tell us at school and why do they tell us that? It is a fact that you do not understand why it is still there. And added to the fact that the painting, which is made in honor of the centenary, is her in the center of the scene, or that it is said to be her (it does not matter if it is her or not). All of that gave me the impulse: there was a secret there”.
—How to quickly define Ladybug?
—She is a woman who attracted a lot of attention at the time. She lived a long time, which was not so common at the time. She had several children, and she might even have died in childbirth. She had a life of exile, she moved a lot. I started researching about her, and I always wanted to film about her. A movie. Or a miniseries. She gives for a lot, for many seasons. But she did not manage to get the funds for those formats. And that’s when I made up my mind: I thought Mariquita needed a first conversation. In terms of cinema with her. It didn’t matter if I did it. What allows you to understand the film is that next to it, also forwards and backwards, there are so many others that are worth knowing.
—Perhaps that is one of its most interesting streaks: to understand that we have not been told of figures similar to or very different from Mariquita.
-Exact. What’s the part they didn’t tell you? What’s the part you don’t know? The story is told with its biases and is cut. It seems to me that it is important that we know that there is a cut. History is told by those who win, right? It is not something that does not happen at this time. The problem of Mariquita is very important, and current, contemporary: women who narrate her story -even those of us who make movies- seeking to tell our story. We are all Ladybug.
—They are all Mariquita because of the risk that…?
“Don’t tell our story. May we be just a lucky line, badly told, clipped, in a history book. And women like a lot of background. And we are talking about a woman with a lot of background, with a lot of action, with a lot of footprints and that she is not there. The other day I saw, for example, that a UN investigation reported that artificial intelligence, the data that builds it, is loaded only 22% by women, that is, a tool that you do not understand already has that bias and has that absence. I don’t want to get into the problems of women who make movies, but that also happens.
-What do you mean?
—Those of us who tell stories, those of us who write scripts, are Mariquita too. Luckily the work exists, the great livelihood of Mariquita, because not all of them have had the ability to write and tell their story, in addition to in this particular case having lived so long and being able to tell since we were Colonia, the beginning of a Nation , and she was there, and she put money to make it happen. She sets the house for the hymn to be sung, and she sings it: the hymn was a forbidden song, which was for those who considered themselves non-Spanish. For singing that song they could shoot you. It is not just putting the house, as they transmit to you: it is putting the body. It is like singing a Peronist march in Recoleta with drums in the 70s. It is a political, patriotic act without a country. It’s not like she has a line either: she changes, she listens. She listened to her children’s friends. Very modern. And very eroticized, with that freedom that one thinks was only for the French. She allowed herself to rethink herself, she was changing according to her civic sense. For example, she stood up to Rosas and protected the writers who wrote against him; I mean, it’s not like she just retired, and she stayed there. She was active. Writing and banking those who had resources.
—When do you decide the final form that the documentary will have?
—I had many doubts if I had to appear or not. What was I doing there? It seemed to me that the excuse was Florencia trying to write the script and me trying to direct. That was a kick to go out and look for information. Since there is no file on it, it had to be recreated. Was she a comb? Or show her as a woman of all time? Then, the fact that she is played by Zoe Gattuso (I wanted her to be a singer, since I always thought she was going to sing the anthem to herself). In this case, it is a stripped hymn, which we made our own (to her and her hymn). That’s why the tattoos, that’s why this Metropolis-style construction (and not the typical colonial recreation), that’s why many decisions, that’s why Mayra Bonard (who embodies another way of Mariquita, with her eroticism, with her ease, transmits a woman desiring, desiring). For me that desiring woman is what defines her.
—Do you feel that what this character founds in you, is it going to continue?
—Well, now I’m working on another project, a biopic (besides the fact that I’d love to do the Mariquita biopic). I think that removing veils is a way of telling other stories. The other day was Labor Day, and for example, Virginia Bolten’s is a great story. Behind every start, every popular revolt, there are always women. We are not just groupies of history. It is interesting to think from a more egalitarian way. There has to be equality. When it comes to everything, movies, history, science, there are women. They are always there. Let’s count. In 1919, Emilia Saleny was making Clarita’s Handkerchief, do you understand? It hadn’t been that long since the Lumiere brothers. Women who do is something that seems important to me. If there are more women writers, there will be other stories. Not only for a question of law, of quotas, but to keep an eye on other views, on other things, in another way. We have to assume a more equal path in everything. The story has to be told to everyone.
The limits of history
—What do you feel about what you discovered about a character that you already had an idea about?
—On the one hand, realizing that Mariquita is somehow a metaphor for our Nation, for many women who work in culture (or in other things). Many things in which I feel very identified. There is a moment when it is said that she is an unexpected woman, and I, for example, do not always make the same films (my previous film was a mainstream comedy and this is a documentary closer to my beginnings, to video dance). I like that, I like to be unexpected in the things I do, although sometimes I pay attention to the gaze of others who think that I am going anywhere. It is very difficult to produce, and it is very difficult to stay in a race. It is current, producing your films, everything is very difficult. Mariquita is someone who makes me wonder: if we don’t know much about her, all that other part where is she? The case of Mariquita is one. When you have to learn, this is not counted: it impresses me to understand how much history is missing. It’s not just a women’s thing. It impresses me to understand how much history has not been told. It’s good that children can understand that their country is built by more than just battles, with streets all named after generals. Not in any country the streets are named after generals and colonels who murdered people.
“What limit did you set, if any?”
—I was very interested in the personal political component, since I feel that she embodies it very well. Something very current. She made her world a world of politics (even in private). She doesn’t take care of me she would tell you, to put it in a way. I think when you mess with a character, you have to expose her strengths and weaknesses.
You may also like