Imagining End Times
Mexican Apocalypses
The documentary film “Imagining End Times - Mexican Apocalypses” presents a temporary exhibition organised by the Käte Hamburger Centre for Apocalyptic and Post-Apocalyptic Studies (CAPAS) of Heidelberg University, together with Mexican partners, in the world-famous Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City, where cultural artefacts and works of art as well as scenarios and traces of the end of the world in Mexico from the Stone Age to the present day are on display. This exhibition is the starting point for a journey through iconic sites in Mexico City and the nearby ancient pyramid city of Teotihuacán.
An international group of CAPAS fellows and Mexican experts use these locations to reflect on the relationship between the exhibition and their research, drawing connections to urgent social and global issues of the present. Archaeologist Patricia Murrieta-Flores, for example, offers insights into the connection between Indigenous concepts and experiences of the end times and the archaeological finds in the remains of the Great Pyramid (Templo Mayor). The curator and director of the Mexican Academy of Fine Arts, Adolfo Mantilla, explains and illustrates the concept of the exhibition, which sees itself as an individual and collective challenge to think critically and creatively about the end of the world and unimagined future horizons from a transcultural and historical perspective.
“Imagining End Times” presents Mexico as one of the most important sites of a colonial end of the world and the emergence of a new world, while also offering insights into transdisciplinary research at CAPAS.
On July 10th, CAPAS invites you to the premiere of the in-house documentary. The screening will be followed by a panel discussion with Robert Folger (CAPAS director, Romance Literature), Adolfo Mantilla Osornio (Anthropology, Academy of Arts Mexico, Curator of the Exhibition ‘Imaginar El Fin de Los Tiempos’) and artist Federico Cuatlacuatl. The event will be held in English.
Running time: 25 minutes 45 seconds
Year of release: 2024
Country of production: Mexico
Director: CAPAS Heidelberg and Onkel Lina
Original in Spanish and English with subtitles