ADMISSION: 
Admission is free and open to current USC students only. RSVP beginning Monday, January 5, 2026, at 10 a.m. 

Content Warning: This event involves discussion and imagery of body piercing, suspension, and nudity. Viewer discretion advised.

DESCRIPTION:
One day after the screening of A Body To Live In, USC students are invited to a workshop with filmmaker Angelo Madsen at ONE Archives at the USC Libraries. Curatorial Assistant Quetzal Arévalo will give a short tour of the exhibition —NEED ME—or, (de)mystifying the myth of the modern primitive, a show that focuses on the queer history of modern body piercing. Following the tour, Angelo Madsen will share unreleased footage from his feature-length documentary about Fakir Musafar and discuss the archival research process, the story of how the film came to be, the ethics of documentary editing, and touch on themes of the film such as BDSM's relationship to mental health and trans relationality.

Bio:

Angelo Madsen (previously known as Madsen Minax) is a filmmaker, visual artist, and educator. His projects consider how human relationships are woven through personal and collective histories, cultures, and kinships. Madsen’s works have shown at Berlinale, Toronto International Film Festival, Tribeca Film Festival, HotDocs, BAM CinemaFest, Art of the Real, BFI, Edinburgh International Film Festival, the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Leslie Lohman Museum, Outfest, Newfest, Frameline, and dozens of LGBT film festivals internationally. His film North By Current (2021) aired on season 34 of POV (PBS) and won both a Cinema Eye Award and an IDA Award for Best Writing. A New York Times Critics Pick, North By Current has been called “A beautiful, complex wonder of a film” by Rolling Stone. Madsen teaches video art at the University of Vermont and is a Queer|Art Mentor, a United States Artists fellow, and a Guggenheim fellow. 

Related Event: 
In the Flesh - A Night on Fakir Musafar with Angelo Madsen and Ron Athey
Thursday, February 26, 2026, at 7 p.m.  
Tommy’s Place  
For more info, click HERE. 

Presented by USC Visions and Voices. Organized by Quetzal Arévalo (ONE Archives at the USC Libraries), Luka Fisher (Curatorial Studies), and Alexis Bard Johnson (ONE Archives at the USC Libraries).

Photo (Angelo Madsen): Leah James