«This Land is My Land» moves fluidly between archival photographs and records, my own original text, and appropriated images from my father’s archive of Super 8 films. Born in Canada, I am a descendant of Ukrainian immigrants who arrived in 1896 in search of a better life. From 1914-1920, Canada rolled out an assault on ethnocultural communities who originated from the belligerent Central Powers, enemies of the British Empire. 8,579 men, women and children were imprisoned without trial. A majority were Ukrainian.
I was almost sixty, when I learn of this atrocity. In making this project I set out not to save the collapsed dreams of my ancestors weighed down by barbed wire and armed guards, nor to create an evidentiary trail of a story little known, but rather to construct a psychic history, to imagine the lives lived, represent trauma, and to resurrect ancestors in an effort to appreciate my place within the larger political, cultural and historical narrative of Canada and my diasporic community.
Conceived as a book project (unpublished) this exhibition consists of pigment prints and a film titled «Oh Canada! Oh Canada!». The accompanying artist’s book, «This Land» is held in esteemed collection in the US.
