Argentine

The Image Man is an ethnobiography of Hermógenes Cayo, a self-taught woodcarver and painter who lives on the high Andean plateau of Argentina. The film portrays Hermógenes, his wife Aurelia Kilpe, and their children in their Andean lifestyle, as well as Hermogenes’ passion for painting, carving, building, and his devotion to the Virgin Mary. The film does not follow a traditional narrative structure, transitioning between themes and revisiting earlier themes later. In this way the film weaves a portrait of Hermógenes Cayo, the craft of image making, an indigenous Catholicism, as well as portraying the lifestyle of a solitary Andean family braving the harsh conditions of their surroundings. The relationship between individual and culture, as well as cultural change, is artfully expressed by Prelorán.