EL SIGNO VACÍO (the empty sign) is a feature-length anthropological journey through the United States’ occupation of Puerto Rico. Mixing over a hundred years of found footage – tourism, agricultural and propaganda films – with contemporary portraits of local artists and activists and Puerto Rican punk rock/noise music, the film reveals how carefully crafted American fictions of “democracy” and “debt” obscure a capitalist and military domination that is ongoing. Moving between old and new; Spanish and English; between paradise and environmental destruction the EL SIGNO VACÍO becomes a “re-educational” film challenging the viewer to re-think about modern colonization, its mechanism and responsibilities.

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Supported by Creative Capital, LEF New England Moving Image grants, Puffin Foundation, Harvard Film Studies Center, Yaddo Artist Retreat, Marion and Jasper Whiting Foundation, a Light Cone/Atelier 105 residency and Emerson College.​

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Virtual Q&A with Kathryn Ramey to follow the screening!

Q&A moderated by Anna Landolfo (BFA On-Camera Acting and BA Film '27)