A Seattle Filmmaker’s Search for ‘The Invisible Father’ | South Seattle Emerald

by Beverly Aarons

Piero Heliczer, Beat poet, experimental filmmaker, and writer, was a central determine within the Sixties and ʼ70s underground artwork scene. He printed dozens of poems, produced not less than 24 movies, and took part in Andy Warhol’s Movie-Makers’ Cooperative. However within the early Nineties, whereas studying his poetry at a venue on the well-known St. Marks Place, Piero was one thing a lot smaller and bizarre: a drunk, raveled, absentee father underneath the important gaze of his 19-year-old daughter, Thérèse Heliczer. 

“How might my mother have fallen in love with this individual [standing] earlier than me?” thought Thérèse, who now lives in Seattle. “I used to be scared of him,” Thérèse mentioned of her dad, “as a result of I used to be being protected against him indirectly.” 

The individuals within the viewers have been enraptured by each phrase her father spoke, however Thérèse couldn’t connect with his poems. He was celebrated and well-respected within the artwork scene, however he was additionally a humiliation for her and her household. There’s a photograph of younger Thérèse standing together with her father on that day in St. Marks, her arms crossed over her physique. It’s clear she didn’t know what to make of this man who was her father, however solely in essentially the most summary which means of the phrase. 

A long time later, Thérèse has produced The Invisible Father, a documentary about Piero’s life that, after two years on the movie competition circuit, was simply launched nationally this spring. 

Lengthy earlier than Thérèse’s aunt and grandmother escorted her to St. Marks Place to fulfill her father for the primary time, she had a longing to know him. However each time she introduced him up, there was a contagious sense of secrecy and warning that made her surprise if he was harmful. In any case, his personal mom wouldn’t give him her handle and would solely meet him in public locations. 

What Thérèse didn’t know as a baby was that her father was affected by untreated psychological sickness. 

She would later uncover that her father had misplaced his personal dad in essentially the most brutal manner attainable: He was tortured and murdered, in Nazi-occupied Italy, by the Gestapo simply weeks earlier than the top of World Conflict II. At simply 6 years outdated, Piero was despatched to establish his father’s mutilated physique. Later in his life, Piero developed schizophrenia and ended up dwelling on the streets of New York after which Normandy, France. 

He would die at 56 years outdated when he was hit by a truck whereas using his moped.

For Thérèse Heliczer, Piero’s loss of life wasn’t the top of her relationship with him. Hidden inside her was a tiny seed of need to essentially know her dad, to know him past the floor chaos of his life. That need would develop and blossom as soon as she had her personal daughter. 

“I used to be seeing my daughter develop up with a father, which I had not had,” Thérèse mentioned. “And so, I began to sort of see the impression that having a dad had in her life.” She talked about her ideas to a buddy who prompt that she make a movie about it. 

Begun in 2012 and completed in 2020, the making of the documentary The Invisible Father despatched Thérèse on a journey throughout america and Europe retracing her father’s inventive life as a poet and experimental filmmaker. She attended the Velvet Underground exhibit in Paris, France, which featured her father’s work. And he or she sought out his friends, pals, and admirers who might share recollections, pictures, and photographs of a person who was simply as a lot a thriller as he was a legend. However via that course of, she was taken on one other journey, one which was each emotional and psychological.

“Making this movie has been the perfect type of remedy for me,” mentioned Thérèse. “The opposite impression of constructing this movie was truly attending to know my mom extra and higher, and understanding her decisions,” Thérèse mentioned.

At one level within the analysis course of, Thérèse found Tremendous 8 footage of her dad and her 20-something mother (pregnant with Thérèse) pleased and in love with one another. She confirmed it to her mom. And the expertise of watching her mom react to it was a transformative expertise for Thérèse. “I had by no means seen that. I had by no means seen these younger bohemian individuals, that have been pleased and in love, that have been my mother and father.” 

Earlier than producing The Invisible Father, Thérèse Heliczer didn’t “absolutely perceive or have a way of the brilliance and the poetry and the inventive and the inventive facet of [Piero].” However in making the movie, Thérèse “got here to phrases with the entire individual that he was.” She additionally supplied her personal daughter a connection to Piero Heliczer as her grandfather, absent of the disgrace and concern that tainted a lot of Thérèse’s childhood understanding of him.

“I’m not embarrassed to be his daughter anymore,” mentioned Thérèse. “I’m not ashamed. Now I do know that he was a really sophisticated individual.”

The Invisible Father is accessible now on most streaming providers.

Beverly Aarons is a author, artist, and sport developer. She works throughout disciplines, exploring the intersections of historical past, hidden present realities, and imagined future worlds. She makes a speciality of making unseen views seen and goals to infuse all of her inventive work with a deep sense of emotionality.

? Featured Picture: Piero Heliczer (proper) was a beat poet, experimental filmmaker, and writer well-respected within the artwork world, however in his family he was an absentee father affected by untreated psychological sickness. In “The Invisible Father,” his daughter Thérèse, retraces his steps in her quest to study extra concerning the artist he was, and the historical past of her family. Pictured with Patti Chenis, Thérèse’s mom. (Photograph: Gerard Malanga)

Earlier than you progress on to the following story …
Please think about that the article you simply learn was made attainable by the beneficiant monetary assist of donors and sponsors. The Emerald is a BIPOC-led nonprofit information outlet with the mission of providing a wider lens of our area’s most various, least prosperous, and woefully under-reported communities. Please think about making a one-time present or, higher but, becoming a member of our Rainmaker Household by turning into a month-to-month donor. Your assist will assist present honest pay for our journalists and allow them to proceed writing the essential tales that supply related information, data, and evaluation. Help the Emerald!