Colectivo Los Ingrávidos

Who are Colectivo Los Ingrávidos?

Colectivo Los Ingrávidos is a collective founded in 2011 by a group of anonymous Mexican artists working between Mexico City and Tehuacán, Puebla. It emerged within the broader framework of social protest against state repression in the country, which has been marked by a resurgence in anti-government student movements and the gradual erosion of democratic rights. Los Ingrávidos aims to challenge the commercialization of creativity and the stale conventions of television and film production.

What are some defining characteristics of their artistic practice?

Colectivo Los Ingrávidos’ practice reveals a multifaceted approach to the contemporary social, political and economic issues in Mexico. Harkening back to the shamanistic rituals of the Aztecs and other Mexican native peoples, Los Ingrávidos’ cinematic interventions are endowed with an oneiric quality that defies anchoring. They bring to the forefront the structural qualities of the image as a political gesture, proposing a delicate space-time network that binds together history, myth and embodiment that spans the gap between the ancestral and the avant-garde.

Rooted in the sense of urgency that defines local struggles, the collective's short films possess a raw and effervescent aesthetic that break apart perceptual imagery. Los Ingrávidos embrace a cinema that draws the viewer into a trance-like state of agitation. This is achieved through complex montage, which conjures up a reality that is not testimonial but ritual, and is meant to forever engrave in the collective memory the names of missing people.

Where have works by Colectivo Los Ingrávidos been exhibited?

Since their establishment, Colectivo Los Ingrávidos’ film works have been shown on screens at museums and festivals around the world. These include: International Film Festival Rotterdam, Exis – Experimental Film and Video Festival in Seoul, Media City Film Festival in Windsor-Detroit, Jihlava International Documentary Film Festival, SGIFF Singapore International Film Festival, Alternative Film Video in Belgrade, and FICValdivia Festival Internacional de Cine de Valdivia.

Museums and institutions that have exhibited the collective's experimental films include: Museum of Modern Art in New York, Tate Modern in London, Block Museum in Chicago, Museum of the Moving Image in New York, Gene Siskel Film Center in Chicago, and the 2019 Whitney Biennial in New York.

What awards and recognitions have Colectivo Los Ingrávidos received?

For their works that explore the liminal space between the brutality of hegemonic policies and the ritual plane of ancestral memories, the collective has received the following international awards: Honorable Mention “Ancestral” at Fenda - International Film Festival- Belo Horizonte, Brasil; Kodak Award at MIFF - Moscow International Experimental Film Festival 2021; Jury Award at Media City Film Festival; Youth Award at Punto de Vista in Spain; Marian McMahon Akimbo Award at the 2018 Images Film Festival; Norberto Griffa Award for Latin American Audiovisual Creation at the 2014 and 2016 BIM.

What projects are Colectivo Los Ingrávidos involved in?

Colectivo Los Ingrávidos maintains anonymity in the public sphere, both as a means of obscuring the identity of its individual members from the purview of government surveillance and as a deliberate relinquishing of authorship that defiantly negates Western notions of artistic ownership and market-driven cultural production. The collective has given theoretical expression to its praxis in its "77 Theses on the Audiovisual" (2021). In 2025, the collective published Colectivo Los Ingrávidos: An Anthology (2012-2024), published by ICA and Batalha Centro de Cinema.

THE SUN QUARTET, PART 1: Piedra de Sol

Where can I find more information about Colectivo Los Ingrávidos?

Colectivo Los Ingrávidos maintains an active presence on their Instagram and X account. All of their video works can be freely accessed on their Vimeo page.