Guenda – A Fashion Art Film

Earlier this year we had the pleasure of welcoming our first ever intern to the MZ team. Natalie helped us out from Oaxaca, documenting the work of the MZ artisans through blogs and photos as well as taking amazing shots of Oaxacan daily life and Manos Zapotecas bags as she went about her adventures.

For the culmination of her three months with us, Natalie proposed a collaborative final project: a video that featured Manos Zapotecas bags and clothes by MariCarmen Marenco, a Mexico City-based fashion designer. They called the project, and the resulting short film, Guenda.

Guenda is a Zapotec word that resists one specific translation but which exemplifies the Zapotec connection to the earth. Irma Pineda, a Zapotec poet from the southern Oaxacan city of Juchitán, translates it into Spanish most often as “soul,” but also as “totem animal,” “spirit,” “guardian,” and “gift,” according to Orion Magazine.

Guenda is a film that explores the tenuous relationship between [wo]man and nature in the modern world, specifically in the urban jungle that is Mexico City. Through the use of music, movement, emotion and setting, the video brings to life the unique spirit of each Manos Zapotecas bag. Enjoy!

A huge thanks to Natalie March, MariCarmen Marenco as well as the Mercado de Luz production company, Zeta Zarraga Oliver, Victoria Andrea Carrazo and Fransisco Paparella.