For…Freedom
For Freedoms Project
Mute
A film commissioned by For Freedoms Project in collaboration with artist Shantell Martin and poet Aja Monet.
THE PROCESS
Stemming from the For Freedom Project’s 2018 50 State Initiative & Beyond, For… Freedom is an interdisciplinary collaboration of film, poetry, and art to help continue a national dialogue around commerce, politics, education, and the role of the artist.
“Spin” was an important theme to me when approaching this project, specifically how facts and truth often get spun out of control in today’s politics and media. I started the film with an animation of Shantell Martin inside the spinning wheel of a zoetrope (see Black Jockeys Praxinoscope sculpture). Unable to keep running in circles, she finally frees herself and jumps into a series of vehicles, whizzing across the country while her tracks leave a drawn map of the United States. Set to Aja Monet’s poem Sometimes An Artist, with an uptempo tune of Amazing Grace in the background, For… Freedom is a meditation on the important role that art, artists and everyday Americans play in unifying a nation.