The Things That Make up my Body

While fighting for survival in the wilds of the Northeast, a drifter unites with a mysterious veteran to expose the truth of America’s demise.

The objects found inside the house seemed of little historical importance - two diaries. But taken together, they form a fantastical little story… and so a filmmaker finds herself caught between fiction and memory, believing in impossibilities.

Sister Jones is facing a life-changing decision: return home and disappoint her family or continue her Mormon mission in Mexico, risking her own happiness amid intense familial and cultural pressures.

The Whole is Greater Than the Sum of Its Parts explores accessibility, memory, and experimental filmmaking as a tool for accessing the inner self. In the Fall of 2019, while traveling across the United States, I taught camera-less film workshops in which I asked participants to express their “inner self” on a strip of 16mm film. These “visual autobiographies” are a synthesis of expression and memory in an abstract form. To capture my own inner, I documented the journey on super 8 film, and drew animations of the landscapes that drifted by me during my travels. My footage is stitched together with the collected consciousness of the many people that I met in these workshops; my memories in conversation with theirs. Each person’s contribution calls to mind one of my own memories, which relates back to the collective memory of the universe.

"...then he saw a tree with white fruit. This sweet fruit made those who ate it happy..." Casting out along rivers of time, evoking the souls surrounding the obelisk itself, the camera traces several stories in two distinct phases...

We were both moving to new places. Quinn to Los Angeles, myself to New York. We were on a rare holiday, and with seemingly nothing else to do, we walked up and down the bike path on the North Shore of Oahu. A hand painted sign caught our attention with an inspiring mantra. - Everest

"A reflection on both our perceptions of ourselves as we age, and my recent move to Vermont, framed by the works of poet Charles Olson."

Nature's Optical Toy is an experimental film and homage to the "phenakistoscope." The film was hand-made with 16mm clear leader and flowers, along with black and white photographs, which were collected on my walks each morning. The contrast of black and white and vibrant color, along with movement allows the viewer to let go as the screen becomes kaleidoscopic and other dimensional. Nature offers us its own optical illusions and filmic qualities if we give it space and time. This film is my attempt at doing it justice.