Teri Wehn Damisch: Transatlantic Crossings Between the Arts

HaFI 023 is the result of a first effort to enhance the visibility of Teri Wehn Damisch’s film and television work, organized in 2022 at the Galerie Colbert (Paris) and the Centre Pompidou through a retrospective, an academic workshop and an exhibition. The booklet contains four texts by Teri Wehn Damisch, attending to the conception of her films on artist Robert Morris, photographer Gisèle Freund and anthropologist Françoise Héritier. An essay by Enrico Camporesi examining the creative process behind her film On Snow’s Wavelength (2001) and a study of her portrait dedicated to set designer Alexandre Trauner, by Christa Blümlinger, complete the collection. The booklet emphasizes the singular pedagogical approach of Teri Wehn Damisch’s documentary films, resulting from her encounters with personalities from the transatlantic world of art and research. The Franco-American director began her career as a television producer in the early 1970s. From the outset, she has been deeply committed to transmitting the cultural, artistic and intellectual spirit of her time, inventing a special setting for each portrait feature. Over the years, she has developed a multi-faceted approach, demonstrating a wide variety of ways to make other people’s words perform.