Bridges
Bridges, a digital public art project, was created by filmmaker Liz Canner during a residency at Paved Art and New Media Center in Saskatoon, Canada, in response to the "starlight tours" (the practice by police officers of leaving Native Americans on the barren prairie in the middle of the night in the dead of winter to freeze to death). For the project, Donna Heimbecker, General Manager of the Saskatchewan Native Theater Company, and Keith Salzl, the Saskatoon Police Service’s Aboriginal Liaison Officer, donned wearcams (a small video camera and microphone worn on the side of eyeglasses) and filmed each other's lives for a day. During the filming, they had a long discussion with the Saskatoon Police Chief about the strained relationship between the police and the Native community, the horrors of the "starlight tours" and the request for justice.
The resulting edited video was projected on the facade of the Saskatoon Police Services building and presented by the Canadian Human Rights Commission at their national convention for all the Human Rights Commissions in Canada. The project generated a symbolic sense of accountability and transparency by revealing some of the inner workings of the police department. It also explored the potential of wearcam filmmaking to create deeper intercultural understanding and inspire positive change.
Note: At the time that the filming took place, two Saskatoon police officers were recently apprehended for participating in a "starlight tour". In this case, the victim survived and was able to identify them. The officers were acquitted of wrong doing in the courts. After the projection took place the police chief, in an unusual move, decided to fire them anyway.
Exhibitions
Large-scale outdoor video projection on the Saskatoon Police Department Building SPASM II: The Couture of Contemporaneity Festival, PAVED media arts centre and AKA Gallery, Saskatoon, Canada, 2004 |
Margaret Mead Film and Video Festival, New Media/New Forms section The Museum of Natural History, New York, NY, 2005 |
Solo Exhibition Brodigan Gallery, Groton School, Groton, MA, 2005 |
Solo Exhibition Dartmouth College Baker Library Gallery Space, Hanover, NH, 2007 |
Canadian Association of Statutory Human Rights Agencies Conference Canada, 2005 |
Press
"Outside the Box: Spasm Festival Takes Art to the Streets" Planet S Magazine |
"Day In The Life: Video Project Takes First Person View of Saskatoon's Racial Divide" Planet S Magazine |