Synopsis
Le récit d’A weaves multiple narratives within a single video, parallel worlds that echo one another without ever intersecting. Esther Valiquette incorporates autobiographical fragments, blending animation and medical imagery to reflect on a broader trace: that of a generation devastated by AIDS, and her own life, stripped of its youth. The video also explores the act of seeing, a shifting awareness, and what can emerge even in the face of an apparently fatal outcome.
A word from Tënk
Initially a technical assistant, Esther Valiquette decided to take up the camera in 1989 after being diagnosed as HIV-positive. She went on to create three short films in quick succession: Le récit d’A (1990), Le singe bleu (1992), and Extenderis (1993), before passing away in Montreal on September 8, 1994, at the age of 31.
Instead of presenting her more well-known work, Le singe bleu, which is more easily available online, we have chosen to highlight Le récit d’A. Despite its singular title, this experimental film intertwines multiple narratives that echo one another indirectly: the story of Andrew—also HIV-positive—, the reflections of Edmond Jabès, and the filmmaker’s own experience, revealed through medical scans. All these threads explored by Valiquette seem to converge in images of the desert. This filmed, tangible desert becomes symbolic, as Valiquette writes, “of the desert of the 1990s; our youth devastated by AIDS, my life deserted of its youth.”
Alex Noël
Author and literature professor
