My name is Jaene F. Castrillon and I am a professional artist residing in Tkaronto, more commonly known as Toronto, Canada. I am an artist that lives with physical, cognitive and psychiatric disabilities. This is my access statement.






First I would like to acknowledge the land that I am on….. Treaty 13 Territory of Tkaronto:

The sacred land on which [I live] has been a site of human activity for 15,000 years. This land is the territory of the Huron-Wendat and Petun First Nations, the Seneca, and most recently, the Mississaugas of the Credit River. The territory was the subject of the Dish With One Spoon Wampum Belt Covenant, an agreement between the Iroquois Confederacy and the Ojibwe and allied nations to peaceably share and care for the resources around the Great Lakes.

Today, the meeting place of Toronto is still the home to many indigenous people from across Turtle Island and we are grateful to have the opportunity to work in the community, on this territory.

**This statement was developed by the Elders Circle (Council of Aboriginal Initiatives). It was last revised November 6, 2014.**

A note about Land Acknowledgements. Acknowledging the stewardship of Indigenous people of the land is not enough. We much learn their ways and care for the land as well as they have. As part of that contract, it is understood that we must also work on our respect of Indigenous people’s and ways of life. We must also learn to be humble enough to understand that nature has it’s own natural law.
Until we learn to live in collaboration with the people, the land and everything in creation as equals and relations, only then, will the land acknowledgement have any honor in the words. The land is the blood of it’s people. Walk softly on it knowing that as we walk on this land, we walk on the blood and bones of the ancestors of the Indigenous peoples who have resided here far longer and lived with the land far better then us.

I would like to say that, for me, being anti poverty, anti oppressive and anti racist is an accessibility issue. As a person who is 2Spirit (gender non conforming) and Indigenous, it is important for my work environments to be as anti oppressive as possible. This includes removing ablest, homophobic, Trans-phobic, sexist, colonial and oppressive mechanisms and languages in the work we do and the environments we work in.

In addition here are some other infographs from Home Office Digital, to help us understand how to accommodate people living with disabilities that may be different needs from ours. For more information, contact: access@digital.homeoffice.gov.uk

My name is Jaene F. Castrillon and I am an interdisciplinary Film based artist residing in Toronto, Canada. By story-telling through art I express what is an internal journey of exploring the spiritual, social, political and cultural issues concerning social justice, advocacy, poverty, marginalization and equality.

I examine the relationship I have to these different structures organically and present it to the audience through an experiential journey. My goal is to shift the paradigm from “marginalization” to acceptance and understanding that people like me are part of the fabric of humanity.

My work, Mourning Song, explores my relationship to the world through my blood memory as an Indigenous person of Chinese descent.

Please feel welcome to look around my studio, at the work I’ve posted up – there are images, videos and text. You are welcome to leave a comment or questions for me in the comments section.

Hope you enjoy your visit,

Jaene

Hi, my name’s Clifford Sage, welcome to my studio. I’m a CGI artist working in animation and world building.  Although I often find technology entrancing, I’ve always appreciated the power and vastness of nature and wilderness- which fuels my interest and curiosity in the potential of virtual worlds. 

Audio and visuals have always gone hand in hand for me, I started my visual practice in 2001 alongside my audio project “Recsund.” I’ve used the medium of sound as a diary throughout my adolescence but later discovered the intertwined nature of audio in my visual work.  I am curious to use sound in interactive and generative ways through game-play and puzzle solving, exploring new ways of storytelling and immersion. 

I am looking forward to taking part in this residency to develop some ideas that I have started to form throughout the last few years, but never had the chance to indulge. I find this opportunity very inspiring but am also overwhelmed with the potential of what can be done within the relatively new area of interactive game design I’m going to be exploring.  I hope that I’m able to create an immersive piece throughout the next few weeks, while exploring and experimenting with ever-changing narratives.  

Please feel welcome to look around my studio, and feel free to leave a comment or questions for me in the comments section, hope you enjoy!

Hi, I’m Angela Su, welcome to my studio.

As an artist from Hong Kong, having an artist studio is a luxury. The virtual studio space is really exciting as I have a chance to showcase not only the finished work but also the research process.

For this residency I will explore the sandbox video game Minecraft as a creative tool that blurs the boundary between the digital and physical worlds. In the Research tab, you will find posts about how the protests in Hong Kong and gaming interact, influence and shape each other — on one hand, street protests borrowed strategies from video games, and on the other hand, banners and slogans appeared on games such as Minecraft and Animal Crossing. I will explore the different ways to engage in digital activism by posting a series of case studies.

Angela

Hi and welcome to my studio, my name’s Seecum Cheung, I primarily work with film as an independent self-shooter.

I work with journalists and experts to conduct interviews with citizens, politicians and specialists in a bid to understand and reflect upon certain political moments in time. My focus for Vital Capacities will be working from this same approach, a long-term study of the gentrification of my father’s ancestral village (in Shenzhen, China) which began in April 2018.

For my time during this residency I would like to gather new recordings of the site through my family who are living next to the village. These will be mobile phone recordings just to get a layout and understanding of the changes on the site. I would also like to process the footage that I already have, work through the material and experiment with creating a new cut from this, in addition, I would like to conduct an interview with Mary Ann O’Donnell, a leading expert on the urban transformations of Shenzhen and blogger behind ‘Shenzhen Noted’.

Please feel welcome to look around my studio, at the work I’ve posted up – there are images, videos and text. You are welcome to leave a comment or questions for me in the comments section.

Hope you enjoy your visit,

Seecum