Jumping Fences: art, healing, and becoming Chicano
written and directed by Alfred Hernandez

In this video I wanted to talk about the malleable nature of identity as I shifted from being an assimilated young adult artist to embracing Chicano identity while working on a video project that helped in the process. I wanted to juxtapose my story as a young adult with my dad's story and his involvement with the Chicano liberation movement in the 1960s. Photographs and super 8 film footage of San Francisco in the 1990s help tell the story.

This video essay is part of a trilogy of autobiographical pieces that focus on the healing power of creativity. I dip into a treasure chest of old photographs, home movie footage from the 1960s, and mix them with footage and images of my own films and videos that go back thirty years or more.

The first installment of the trilogy starts with Drawings of a Teenager - where I track my experience with social anxiety as a young man while at the same time falling in love with art and animation which pull me through what was otherwise a difficult time.

Throughout these essays I take a look at how identity developed in my life and how I chose to embrace them, understand them, and then throw them off as an attempt to connect with the eternal Mystery.