Camille Henrot

Henrot uses slow motion to create an engrossing meditation on the power dynamics at play in intimacy.

This exhibition in our video gallery spotlights the 2017 film Tuesday, made by French artist Camille Henrot (born 1978). The work juxtaposes footage of two kinds of athletes in peak physical form: pairs of grappling Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu fighters and several large, muscular racehorses. In the film, Henrot uses slow motion to create an engrossing meditation on the power dynamics at play in intimacy. Dramatically slowed down, the locks and chokeholds characteristic of Jiu-Jitsu suddenly seem caring, even gentle. Interspersed with these scenes are ones of caregivers washing and grooming horses in the hours before their races begin. The careful braiding of their manes is especially tactile and intimate.

Henrot utilizes heightened, cinematic images of touch to interrogate the tensions inherent in physical connection. The viewer is further immersed in this environment through the inclusion of wrestling mats underfoot, bringing the feeling of the dojo into the museum. In capturing both human and equine competitors, Henrot’s film investigates the fluid—and sensual—forces of dominance and submission, inspired by theorist Michel Foucault’s notion that “If there was no resistance, there would be no power relations.”

Camille Henrot, French, born 1978
Tuesday, 2017
© ADAGP Camille Henrot. Courtesy of the artist, Mennour and Hauser & Wirth.