We Are The Explorers

About this title

Super 8 film was a format created for home movies. Eve-Lauryn LaFountain uses her super 8 films to juxtapose her own personal experiences with each other and with history. This film was mostly shot during a trip home to New Mexico and also features a trip to Joshua Tree on the first day of 2015. There are undercurrents of the legacy of colonialism and missionaries while showing the 90th annual celebration of the burning of Zozobra, and an ascent to an ancient Kiva. Clues of place and history appear in the sound collage of her field recordings. There's mention of cutting off Juan de Oñate's foot, drones, and an Ojibwe burial song recorded at LaFountain's grandmother's funeral and used as a blessing for the ancestral people of Bandelier National Monument. Her use of montage creates a collage of the artist's life.